The Savages in Love and War - Hardcover

Stewart, Fred Mustard

3.35

20 ratings by Goodreads

9780312874858: The Savages in Love and War

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312874855 ISBN 13: 9780312874858

Publisher: Forge Books, 2001

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The Savages in Love and War is the next installment in Fred Mustard Stewart's riveting historical saga of a powerful family whose lives are played out at center stage of a new age and whose individual passions and rivalries will influence and shape some of the most memorable events of the twentieth century.

Young Nick Savage came through the Roaring Twenties poorer but unbroken. He takes on the task of steering the family fortunes and preserving what they have left . . . and of helping his new friend, FDR, help the rest of the country do the same.

Meanwhile, Nick's sister, Brook, is in Paris, struggling alongside her aristocratic husband to hold on to the dreams of their youth, even as they watch the political storm clouds coming from Germany threaten all they love.

And in the Far East, the Asian branch of the Savages, stemming from the love between the seafarer Justin Savage and the beautiful Chinese pirate Ching Mei, has come to great wealth and respectability . . . and is trying to keep what has been so carefully built up in the face of the growing power of the Rising Sun.

The various branches of the Savage clan have been flung far and wide, and as the world careens from the excesses of the Jazz Age to the cruel wake-up call of the Depression, from the terrors of one world war and to the start of another global conflict, we follow this family through heartbreak and triumph. As their unique stories are told, we see the history of three continents unfold: a Europe that is exhausted from a devastating world war an Asia that is trying to throw off imperialism, and finally an America poised on the brink of desperation . . . or at the dawn of its greatest power.

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From Publishers Weekly:

A new generation of Savages take center stage as Stewart slickly shepherds his ultra-elite family through the pre-WWII era in this superficial pop history romp. The primary protagonist is Nick Savage, who meets the young FDR as a banker while trying to salvage the family fortune, a connection that later pays off when Roosevelt appoints him ambassador to France in the late 1930s. Savage's equally chaotic love life begins when he marries young to a woman who turns out to be an alcoholic and "a silly shopper," and dies during childbirth. His second wife, an idealistic Englishwoman who unexpectedly inherits a fortune of her own, proves to be the love of his life. Nick's female counterpart in the narrative is his sister-in-law, Gloria, an aging actress and widow of an Indiana industrialist now burdened with caring for her problematic young twins, Mark and Sebastian, the former dying after a bout with polio by talking his brother into helping him commit suicide. Stewart's prose reads quickly and glibly; the early sections especially are full of lazy writing in which characters narrate events in place of genuine action. Nick Savage's adventures in Europe are woefully unrealistic, particularly when he joins his sister, Brooks, in the Resistance, and a subplot set in Asia is designed only to complete the historical time line. Gloria's adventures are slightly more entertaining, but most of the novel reads like a bad cross between a bodice ripper, a History Channel bromide and an episode of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. The result is an instantly forgettable book that falls way below such Stewart standards as The Mephisto Waltz.

From Booklist:

Stewart continues to chronicle the international adventures of the far-flung Savage clan. From New York to Paris to Hong Kong, various members of this strikingly cosmopolitan family are involved in a dazzling array of business, political, and social concerns. Assuming patriarchal status from a rapidly declining Johnny Savage, young Nick attempts to resuscitate both the moribund Savage fortune and his own ailing love life during the lean Depression years. Finance, however, takes a back seat to intrigue and diplomacy when he becomes ambassador to Germany on the eve of World War II. Meanwhile, sister Brook and her aristocratic French husband join the Resistance, and the Savage cousins attempt to overcome the Japanese threat to their Asian enterprises. As the Savages survive the vagaries of war, the stage is set for the next generation to weather their own personal and financial storms. This is another satisfying installment in a juicy dynastic saga. Margaret Flanagan
Copyright � American Library Association. All rights reserved

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