All Kinds of Love - Hardcover

Reiner, Carl

3.58

19 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1559721634 ISBN 13: 9781559721639

Publisher: Birch Lane Pr, 1993

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In a tale of unconventional love, Fred and Sharon Cox are each separately having an affair with their alluring Japanese tutor, Hana Yoshi, while their son is plotting to run away with one of the twin Salvadoran housekeepers

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From Kirkus Reviews:

The sexual philanderings of a well-to-do California family provide a subject for film director Reiner's farcical second novel (belatedly following Enter Laughing, 1958): a heavy-handed comedy whose stereotypical characters and predictable turns would probably have played better on the screen. When middle-aged independent film producer Fred Cox decides to hire a Japanese language instructor for a few lessons before he goes on vacation in that country with wife Sharon, he's as surprised as anyone when the instructor turns out to be tall, slender, drop-dead-gorgeous Hana Yoshi. Sharon, a pert California matron whose hair is dyed to match the family dog's fur, takes one look at Hana and decides she'd better sign up for lessons, too- -little realizing that while her husband will predictably become obsessed with the Japanese beauty, Sharon will also fall for her. Bored with each other, all pumped up by their personal trainer with nowhere to go, Sharon and Fred gleefully but separately throw themselves into language lessons taught while participating in Hana's sensuous massage, hot tub, and lovemaking sessions. Meanwhile, their 16-year-old son, Kevin, who's carrying on an affair with Maria--one of the Cox household's Salvadoran maids--is delighted when the three grown-ups trip off to Tokyo together, since this leaves the two young lovers with the run of the house in Bel Air. Before you can say, ``Whoops, I forgot the condoms,'' Kevin gets Maria pregnant, the couple flee to Miami in a panic, and the house of cards created by the family's shenanigans collapses- -causing Fred to suffer a heart attack, Sharon to divorce him and move in with Hana, and their son to become the proud if harassed teenaged father of the first of the next generation of Coxes. Silly, uptight comedy with a dated Sixties feel. -- Copyright �1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly:

Reiner is nothing if not protean; from Your Show of Shows through dozens of films to this, his second novel (after Enter Laughing ) he has shown a delightfully wry sense of humor. All Kinds is an amusing attempt at pure farce, a difficult genre to sustain in any medium, particularly literature. Independent film producer Fred Cox and his wife, Sharon, are preparing for a trip to Japan by taking language lessons from the statuesque Hana Yoshi. Her methods are hands-on, to say the least, and in quick order she has seduced both her pupils. In the meantime, Kevin, their 16-year-old son, is getting ready to run off with one of the identical twin Salvadorean housemaids, whom he has inpregnated. Stir into this melange a private detective, an oversexed gynecologist and Fred's Jewish parents in Miami Beach. Everyone seems to be suffering from perpetual sexual hunger, including the octogenarian generation of Coxes, and much of the humor stems from the extremes the characters reach in their attempts to match love to lust. In addition, there are some cynical jokes at the expense of the Beverly hills lifestyle and film producers who buy properties they haven't read. Although the pace is fast and the humor broad, the book is more sweet-natured than you might expect, with everyone finding redemption and true love by the final pages. Author tour.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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