Lubricious trash, the fourth from the bestselling author of The Harris Family (2001).
Sex and more sex among the buppies of Chicago.
Black businessman Jayson Abrahms is madly in love with fiancée Faith, a social worker, but he can’t stand her best friend Karen, who has no manners at all, even offered him the chewed-up remnants of the last breadstick on the table when he complained about the way she helped herself to it. Guess he’ll have to accept Faith’s friends whether he likes them or not—damn, he’d do anything for that woman. His friend Asha, a beautiful half-Japanese, half–Native American, privately thinks Jayson lets Faith walk all over him but she keeps quiet. Asha, a masseuse, has troubles of her own. She’s attracted to the women she rubs down at the spa, but she doesn’t believe she could possibly be gay. After all, she’s engaged to Gill, a handsome brown brotha and successful investment banker from North Carolina who loves to spoil her with trinkets, attention, and pounding sex in the shower. Yet Asha can’t stop fantasizing about the luscious breasts, perky nipples, and rounded buttocks. Meanwhile, her latest love, Angie, can’t come out of the closet because of her young son. She doesn’t want him mashing naked Barbie dolls together at school and announcing that he has two mommies. So Asha pines for Angie, who enjoys her sensual ministrations—until huge, mean Leslie (“Big Les”) tries to come between them, hoping the beautiful masseuse will perform oral sex on her. Spurned, Les plots revenge—as we segue to Faith, having an affair with studly Gary, who’s married. Clueless Jayson can’t believe the videotape, thoughtfully provided by Karen, of Faith enthusiastically fellating Gary. Does Karen want to supplant Faith in his affections? Is she just a bitch? Well, no more than Les, who subjects Asha to a lesbian gang rape with a monster dildo wielded by a few of her prison pals. And so on.
Lubricious trash, the fourth from the bestselling author of The Harris Family (2001).Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2002
ISBN: 0-7432-2973-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2002
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Agreeably credible lovers and a neat piece of home-restoration compensate some for the hokey hauntings on the bayou. Loyal...
A gumbo seasoned with ghosts, love, and murder on the bayou.
When 30-something Declan Fitzgerald of Boston, a successful lawyer and a member of a large and loving family, breaks off his engagement to very suitable Jessica, he knows he needs to change his life. Lawyering is not fun anymore, so, recalling Manet Hall, an old deserted plantation house he once visited with law school classmate and New Orleans native Remy, he buys the property and moves down south. Declan is also a gifted craftsman, a born decorator, and very, very rich. Soon, he meets beautiful Lena, who’s visiting her grandmother Odette, Declan’s friendly Cajun neighbor. Declan is as certain that Lena is destined to be his wife as he was that Manet Hall would become his home. But, surprise, Lena has a troubled past (like the house) and is determined to resist Declan’s courtship. While he suits Lena and works on the place, Declan experiences troubling dreams. It seems he’s actually reliving the novel’s parallel story, which took place in 1899. In that year, the maid, Abbey Manet (from whom Lena, coincidentally, is descended, and who married wealthy Lucian Manet), was raped and murdered by her brother-in-law Julian as she nursed her baby daughter. Her body was dumped into the bayou by her mother-in-law, who despised her. And grief-stricken husband Lucian, away at the time, being told that Abbey had run off, committed suicide. Now, in an unconvincing twist of gender and reincarnation, it’s Declan who hears a baby crying , experiences childbirth and rape as the reincarnation of Abbey, while Lena is Lucian. The two accept all this with equanimity, and, Manet Hall’s secrets revealed, it becomes the setting for predictable and much foreshadowed resolutions.
Agreeably credible lovers and a neat piece of home-restoration compensate some for the hokey hauntings on the bayou. Loyal fans will enjoy.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-399-14824-8
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2001
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