MAGAZINE

  - News
  - Features
  - Events Calendar

  - Hivemind Community
  - Movie/TV Reviews
  - Book Reviews
  - Blogs
  - Polls
  - Groups
  - Games: Scifi Play

   
  More on SFcrowsnest's mag

 STEPHEN HUNT

  - StephenHunt.net

  - Home  
  - Worlds  
  - Biography  
  - Bibliography  
  - Appearances  
  - Reviews  
  - Blog  
  - Community  
  - Press  
  - Links  

  The Court of the Air
 
  The Kingdom Beyond the Waves

  The Rise of the Iron Moon

  - Stephen on BookArmy
  - Stephen on FaceBook
  - SH's FaceBook fans
  - Stephen on Twitter

 ONLINE MOVIES

  SCIFI Search

  - Web Site Directory
 
- Search the Net

  TOOLS

  - Our Daily RSS Feed
  - Us on FaceBook
  - Add our news widget
  - Google Toolbar scifi
  - Offworld Report

 VISIT OUR ADVERTISERS

Breakfast With The Ones You Love by Eliot Fintushel
01/07/2007 Source: Geoff Willmetts 

pub Bantam Spectra. 275 page enlarged paperback. Price: $12.00 (US), $15.00 (CAN). ISBN: 978-0-553-38405-5.

Buy Breakfast With The Ones You Love in the USA - or Buy Breakfast With The Ones You Love in the UK

check out websites: www.bantamdell.com

This is an odd book which I feel loses the plot half-way. Author Eliot Fintushel's background lies with short stories and this looks like his first novel-length.

The first half is certainly interesting. Hiding out in the Jewish section of New York, goth or punk-looking and occasional waitress Lea Tillim can kill with a thought. She is befriended by Jack Konar aka The Yid, after she rescues him from an apparent mugging. He's using hashish deals to help fund a rocket he is building, sees Lea as a member of the team and enlists her to help. From such does the start of romances begin except this one becomes still-born after Konar is kidnapped after a boxing match which Lea was supposed to fix and got the wrong man.



From there, the story goes askew as Konar's colleagues come out of the woodwork to help rescue and send him on his way.

Had Fintushel played it straight all the way through leaving it to the reader to decide whether Konar was delusional or not this might have been a better novel. In the end, I felt he was getting bored or needed something to spice the story's SF elements up. Considering this story was also written in the first person through Lea's eyes we don't see the whole story, especially in the last half of the book.

This isn't to say the first half isn't interesting. This part is especially good with some nice character pieces. Fintushel should have kept to this more than go as experimental as he did towards the end. Looking at the awards he has for his short stories, his fans are probably going to be more in tune with this book than those coming to his material fresh. Once he settles down into the long form, confidence will show which way he wants to write.

GF Willmetts

Add SFcrowsnest.com daily news updates to your own web site or blog - just cut and paste the code below...

POST YOUR COMMENTS

CLICK HERE TO HAVE YOUR SAY

click here to buy Stephen Hunt's The Kingdom Beyond the Waves

Get our Free MagBacktop of the page

Home | About Us | Write for Us | Subscribe to our Free Magazine | Advertiser Login

All content, unless otherwise indicated, is © www.SFcrowsnest.com 1991-2009 - our content management proudly powered by CuteNews


Advertise on SFcrowsnest: Click here

Recent Book ReviewsBook review archive