In the two decades since The World According to Garp, the world according to Irving has spun in place. Dark comedy still rules. Slapstick mixes with kinky sex and flashes of brutal violence. Plot loops back on itself, pretzeled by symmetrical twists. Prose is serviceable and heavily italicized for the reader's convenience. Smack in the center is a wildly dysfunctional family.
Ruth Cole's two older brothers died in a grisly car crash before she was born. Her father, who writes scary children's books, is serially unfaithful. Her gorgeous mother, though semicatatonic with grief, summons the energy for a torrid affair with a 16-year-old boy. Then she abandons her family entirely. Just 4 when her mother decamps, Ruth grows up to be a hugely successful novelist with a miserably unsuccessful love life. Will she find happiness? Almost everybody in A Widow for One Year is a writer, and they freely dispense advice about the novelist's craft. Here's more: Change your shtick at least once every quarter-century. And please, go easy on the italics. (Random House, $27.95)
Bottom Line: Same old, same old
by Jack Higgins
Page-turner of the week
The Second World War ended more than five decades ago, but to the delight of his battalions of loyal fans, the Big One goes on for British novelist Higgins, author of such bestsellers as The Eagle Has Landed and Eye of the Storm. This tale revolves around identical twins who are separated during childhood. American Harry Kelso serves as a top-gunning Yank in the RAF. His German-raised brother Max becomes a Luftwaffe ace. From the Battle of Britain to D Day, the brothers fly toward what seems to be a final confrontation in the skies. Meanwhile, a nifty love story involving the brothers sweetens the action, and cameos by Himmler and Eisenhower lend a whiff of history. So stand at ease, troops, and enjoy this finely wrought saga of honor and family in an era long gone—but not at all forgotten. (Putnam, $24.95)
Bottom Line: Good tale of sibling rivals at war, big time
by Gerald Posner
Who killed Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. 30 years ago? James Earl Ray pleaded guilty to shooting King and, despite recanting his confession in 1969, was in prison for the crime until his death from liver disease on April 23. But King's widow and son insist Ray was merely a patsy in a sweeping murder conspiracy.
Hogwash, says lawyer Posner, who in 1994's Case Closed debunked theories about JFK's assassination. Here he demolishes Ray's shifting claims and alibis by reconstructing his activities in the months prior to King's death. Posner's convincing conclusion: Ray, a small-time loser, most likely killed King on his own. (Random House, $25)
Bottom Line: Solid sleuthing, arrestingly presented
by Suzanne Somers
"Celebrity is an amazing gift," says Suzanne Somers in her new memoir (subtitled How I Picked Myself Up, Dusted Myself Off, and Started All Over Again). But once you're famous, she adds, you're not expected to evolve as a person—to read or think or develop your personality. "Nobody cares!" she says. "Just keep the profits rolling in." But as she first told readers in Keeping Secrets, her 1988 bestseller about growing up with an alcoholic father, the former Three's Company star continues to take her personal growth seriously. With appealing candor, Somers now explores how she coped with her rise to TV stardom in the '70s, her eventual alienation from castmates Joyce De Witt and John Ritter, and her rapid fall after she quit the series in 1982. Gracefully written, Somers's story of how she adjusted to life beyond the small screen and then reinvented herself as a successful Las Vegas act, ThighMaster entrepreneur and author is inspirational. Also, the twice-married mother and stepmother—and now 51-year-old grandmother of three—offers hope for anyone in a complicated stepfamily, the very situation Somers faces up to in the current CBS sitcom Step by Step. (Crown, $23)
Bottom Line: Affable, introspective memoir of a sitcom survivor
>QUARANTINE Jim Crace In this thorny retelling of his 40 days in the wilderness, Christ is first embraced by the wicked, not the devout. (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $23)
EASY RIDERS, RAGING BULLS Peter Biskind A revealing take on the headstrong Hollywood directors of the '70s, like Coppola, Spielberg, Scorsese and Lucas. (Simon & Schuster, $25)
CONFEDERATES IN THE ATTIC Tony Horwitz The South rises again in this remarkable study of modern-day Civil War reenactors by a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter. (Pantheon, $27.50)
THE GRAVITY OF SHADOWS David Ramus Can't detect the fictional brush strokes in this lifelike art-world thriller? No wonder: Its author, an ex-dealer, did time for art fraud. (HarperCollins, $24)
RED-TAILS IN LOVE: A WILDLIFE DRAMA IN CENTRAL PARK Marie Winn A true-life nature tale in the heart of Manhattan, where rare hawks mate just a wingbeat away from Woody Allen's love nest. (Pantheon, $24)
- Contributors:
- Adam Begley,
- J.D. Reed,
- Alex Tresniowski,
- Victoria Balfour.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
