Word: benchleys
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FICTION: The Collected Stories, Isaac Bashevis Singer ∙ Family Trade, James Carroll ∙ Forsaking All Others, Jimmy Breslin ∙ The Girl of the Sea of Cortez, Peter Benchley ∙ The South Florida Book of the Dead, Robert Merkin ∙ Worldly Goods, Michael Korda
...GIRL OF THE SEA OF CORTEZ by Peter Benchley Doubleday; 237 pages...
Just when everyone thought it was safe to go back into bookstores, here comes the opening image of Peter Benchley's new novel: "The girl lay on the surface of the sea, looking into the water through a mask, and was afraid." This time, though, the menace is misleading. The author of Jaws has produced a simple story that is longer on charm than chills. Paloma, 16, lives on an island in the Sea of Cortez (the Gulf of California) and mourns her drowned father. For comfort, she spends her days skindiving at the secret place he had shown...
...stop them or prevent news of the find from reaching all the other fishermen in her village. But she bumps into an improbable ally: a giant manta ray that seems as interested in preserving the seamount as she is. Lest credulity be overstrained, a dust-jacket photograph shows Author Benchley riding on the back of a manta ray. If he can do it, so, presumably, can Paloma. Such authentication is really unnecessary. The Girl of the Sea of Cortez is an underwater morality play with a happy ending. Fabulous events do not seem unbelievable when they occur in a fable...
...glamour grew proportionately, the residences of its stars became more lavish too. There was the Hollywood Hotel, where Rudolph Valentino married Actress Jean Acker and spent his honeymoon. The Garden of Allah, which opened with an 18-hour party, was a haven for writers including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Robert Benchley and Dorothy Parker...