Taboo [Hardcover]

Elizabeth Gage (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 1993

Kate Hamilton journeys to Hollywood during the golden era of the 1930s and 1940s, seeking stardom but unable to escape her dark past, and encounters Eve Sinclair, a ruthless former child star, and charismatic producer Joseph Knight.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The sizzling wit of Gage's bestseller A Glimpse of Stocking is missing in this gushing potboiler about Hollywood in its heyday, the 1930s and '40s. Having left home at age 16 and later escaped a smooth-talking criminal of a husband, Kate Hamilton drifts toward Tinseltown, where her offbeat beauty and lofty disinterest in stardust act as catnip on a few key players. Among them is writer-director-producer Joseph Knight, who started off as a lowly roustabout before vaulting to glory as a creative force to rival Orson Welles. Kate's success seems assured when she lands a role in Knight's new film, replacing Eve Sinclair, a celebrated actress grown bitchy with unrequited love for the ubiquitous Knight. Ah, but Kate's past--and Eve's ire--catch up, and the resulting conflagration threatens her fame and her marriage to Knight. These cardboard characters are painted in implausibly bold colors: while still a nobody, Knight comes up with an idea for a movie, determines that "all the truly gifted writers had long since been snapped up by the major studios," decides to write it himself and turns out a screenplay worthy of an Oscar. Though Gage lavishes these pages with Hollywood glitter and the requisite dabblings with booze, drugs and sex, the dramas she sets up lack emotional resonance and often simply fall flat. Doubleday Book Club and Literary Guild featured alternate.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Gage, author of A Glimpse of Stocking (S. & S., 1988) , Pandora's Box ( LJ 8/90), and The Master Stroke (Pocket Bks., 1991), here returns to Hollywood--this time in the 1930s--to write a novel that seemingly has everything: child abuse, wife beating, alcoholism, perfunctory sex, blackmail, robbery, torture, more perfunctory sex, murder, and suicide. No vice large or small seems to have been missed. Unfortunately, the three main characters--a child star, an aspiring star, and a Hollywood producer--are much too shallow and superficial to pull all this human wickedness together and make us care. A Jackie Collins clone gone awry, this book should be taboo for public libraries with limited fiction budgets. Larger libraries with more generous funds might consider purchase since it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club as a featured selection, but most readers can do themselves a favor and reread Valley of the Dolls. -- Margaret Hanes, Sterling Heights P.L., Mich.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 465 pages
• Publisher: Pocket Books; First edition (April 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671786415
• ISBN-13: 978-0671786410
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.5 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #949,509 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My fav book ever!, August 10, 1999

By 

[e-mail] (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Taboo (Hardcover)

Well, what can I say? If you like Jackie Collins.. read this! It's even better. It's got twists and turns and every time you think you know what's going to happen...BOOM! She shocks you w/another twist. This is my favorite book and I highly recommend it!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Taboo leaves a haunting thought on love.., June 13, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Taboo (Paperback)

Although the plot needs a few details to enhance its credibility, the entire story is beautifully presented to its finale - love that is so painfully beautiful that it is a sin to love as much. It leaves a slightly disturbing view of what is left of us when loves consumes so much of us that there is little left when it's gone. This is the kind of love many of love yearn for in love, willing to exchange to have it. Life may very well be the price to pay to have it. This is all states beautifully with the quote: "When love comes, you plunge without thinking. You see that your life was an empty shell before love came, so you turn your back on the past without a second thought. And then, when the world comes back to claim its own, there's no way to fight it, because you have no heart to endure loneliness anymore. You've thrown it away, like a child throwing away a paper toy." Again, Gage has written something of a fiction that is a little beyond just a story.. always nice to have something to think about after reading a book.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars OH THOSE SECRETS, May 6, 2005

By 

Martin Boucher "Authorfan" (Montreal, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Taboo (Paperback)

Here's another sizzler set in Hollywood, this time in the 1930's. The lives of the movers and shakers in TABOO are a roller coaster ride of sins and secrets and of unattainable happiness. Gage's two main sufferers, Kate Hamilton and Joseph Knight, go through the melodramatic motion of uniting then paying the price for it. But it's Eve Sinclair, the child superstar, who really makes TABOO a delicious romp. Her cold-hearted volcanic temperament will make any fan of Valley of the Dolls stand up and cheer.-----Martin Boucher