ZERMATT - Softcover

Schaeffer, Frank

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0552779296 ISBN 13: 9780552779296

Publisher: Black Swan, 2013

Synopsis

Calvin Becker's strict fundamentalist upbringing means he's never seen a film, watched television or danced. He even has to hide his five second-hand copies of Mad magazine in the attic. Now he and his family - his embarrassingly devout missionary parents and his sisters, the tyrannical 18 year-old Janet and the angelic Rachael - are on their modest annual skiing holiday in Switzerland. For the Beckers, the Hotel Riffelberg had always provided a safe haven from the jazz-loving sinners who congregate further down the mountain in Zermatt, but this is 1966, the year of peace, love and the Beatles, and the world is changing. As is the irrepressible Calvin...In his innocent 14 year-old body the hormones are raging, awakening a volcanic sexual curiosity and he willingly succumbs to the ample charms of Eva, the young waitress who introduces him to ecstasies beyond his wildest dreams. But then Calvin's mother catches him supposedly in the act and things start to go awry, triggering a climactic end to his childhood (and the family holiday).

About this title

About the Author

The son of missionary parents, Frank Scaeffer was born in 1952 and when young did live in Switzerland and holiday on the Italian Riviera. He now lives in New York and Massachusetts. Portofino was his first novel, Zermatt continues the story of Calvin Becker and his hilarious, holier-than-thou family. With his son John, he wrote the New York Times bestseller, Keeping Faith: A Father-Son Story about Love and the United States Marine Corps.

From AudioFile

Second in a proposed trilogy, ZERMATT recounts Calvin Becker's coming-of-age within his fundamentalist missionary family. Calvin's never danced, seen a movie or a television program, and his home schooling has left him deficient in reading. When the family takes a ski vacation at their accustomed low-budget hotel, far from the "sinners" in the village, they discover shocking changes--guests who smoke, drink alcohol, and enjoy music. In a painfully believable performance, Lloyd James suffers Calvin's adolescent misery as he finds himself trapped in a humorless evangelical dogma-spouting nightmare. James is utterly convincing as Calvin, consumed by curiosity about the opposite sex, becomes carnally enlightened by a Swiss waitress of 35. As the inevitable crisis of faith occurs, James's performance combines pathos with comedy, making the ingenuous, if not-so-innocent Calvin, a character to remember. S.J.H. © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Edition details

• Publisher: Black Swan
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0552779296
• ISBN 13: 9780552779296
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 320