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Synopsis
With dark poetry and domestic acuity, the author of Homework shows how families pull together, form themselves anew, and occasionally fly apart at the seams. Ranging from Scotland to America to Italy--and to a novel-within-a-novel--Criminals brilliantly captures the stories of complicated, sympathetic people who try to do right but turn somehow wrong. LG Alternate.
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Review
Criminals is a tweaked gothic. Instead of a dark castle, there is an average Scottish farmhouse, Mill of Fortune. There is nothing supernatural, and the love story is all in one character's mind, nearly losing him his livelihood. Ewan is less a knight-at-arms than a London businessman, and his sister is the madwoman. Mollie, however, is not in the attic, but very much up and about after her novelist-lover has left her. Ewan knows he must check on her and heads for Scotland. During a bus layover, he hears a small whimper and is amazed to find a baby in a bathroom stall. Hearing his bus about to leave, he grabs the bundle and ends up taking it with him.
Unfortunately, Mollie's reaction is not one he had hoped for: instead of calling the police, she lays siege, and their criminal career begins. Margot Livesey is clearly interested in exploring one question: How much do you really know about your family? For six chapters, the narration goes back and forth between brother and sister, but the seventh is a surprise--devoted to the man who left the baby on the filthy floor. Kenneth's thought processes are sinister and idiotic, giving him a great deal of comic energy. Having followed Ewan to Mill of Fortune, he is determined to bilk him out of as much money as possible. "Ideas, he thought, I am an ideas man." As Kenneth does his brutal best and Ewan is caught up in insider-trading complications, Mollie--still hanging onto the child--grows increasingly paranoid: "She heard something. Had Ewan spoken? Had the table? She examined each in turn. The sleek wood had grown oddly smug and duplicitous ..." Livesey is an expert practitioner of the fiction of threat, the novel of isolation and misery in which the family is a nest of sorrows.
About the Author
Margot Livesey is the author of several novels, including Homework and Eva Moves the Furniture, as well as the story collection Learning By Heart. Born in Scotland, she lives in Boston, Massachusetts, where she is the writer in residence at Emerson College.
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- PublisherKnopf
- Publication date1996
- ISBN 10 0679444874
- ISBN 13 9780679444879
- BindingHardcover
- Edition number1
- Number of pages271
- Rating
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Criminals
Published by
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 1996
ISBN 10: 0679444874
ISBN 13: 9780679444879
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Criminals
Published by
Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1996
ISBN 10: 0679444874
ISBN 13: 9780679444879
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Hard Cover. Condition: Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good. First Edition. CB5 - A first edition ex-library hardcover book SIGNED by author in good condition in very good dust jacket that is mylar protected. Dust jacket has taped label, wrinkling on some edges, inside flaps adhered to the fixed endpapers, light discoloration and shelf wear. Book lightly cocked, library markings (labels, stamping, cardholder, etc.), front free endpaper cutout, some light stains and dog-eared pages, light discoloration and shelf wear. 8.5"x5.75", 271 pages. Satisfaction Guaranteed. Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. Signed by Author. Ex-Library. Seller Inventory # SCW04943
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Criminals: A Novel
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Alfred A. Knopf (Borzoi Book), 1995., 1995
ISBN 10: 0679444874
ISBN 13: 9780679444879
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Soft cover. Condition: Very Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good. 1st Edition. Stated first edition. (ISBN 0-679-44487-4) Advance reading copy (ARC) trade paperback. Near fine tight copy, unread, near fine shiny wrappers. A stunning novel of filial, maternal, and romantic love. A decent, harried young banker, already on the verge of distraction, hurries north to Scotland and his mysteriously troubled sister. A "foreign" mother struggles to make a home for her family in a society she only vaguely comprehends. A baby girl is abandoned in a bus-station rest room. In Criminals Margot Livesey shows how the best intentions can somehow turn wrong and how families pull together, form themselves anew, and occasionally, tear apart at the seams. This wholly original novel is sure to be among the most discussed books. Novel. Seller Inventory # ivimta4"92
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