Equal-opportunity employer Brown’s warrior gals achieve near parity with the gents, and there’s a cute Persian princess. Oh,...
Techno-thriller specialist Brown, who never met a weapons system, real or imagined, he could resist, piles them on in spectacular quantity, pitting his Air Force hero Patrick McLanahan (Air Battle Force, 2003, etc.) against everything Iran can throw at him and his gadgets.
Those dumb bunnies in Congress. Will they ever learn that Lt. Gen. McLanahan, with his laser cannons, space fortresses, robots, drones, killer satellites and fuels of the future, always knows best how to handle the Dark Forces that threaten America. Alas, no. As usual, the knuckleheads in the capital and subversive members of the president’s own staff are looking for ways to throttle funding for McLanahan’s latest and most fabulous gizmo, “The Stud,” a sleek aircraft capable of easing itself into outer space and orbiting while toting enough payload to incinerate several missile sites and God knows how many armies of terrorists. Who wouldn’t want a fleet of such swell planes? Well, the usual dunderheads in the Pentagon—dinosaurs wedded to their old oxygen-breathing subsonic bombers and slow-as-molasses carrier task forces, systems that show up days late and dollars short against the ballistic threats wielded by the Ayatollah’s loyal armies—that’s who. And Iran is at the boil. There’s a disgraced former head of the defense forces stirring up enough trouble that the Islamic Republic could erupt in civil war, and it’s making the mullahs crazy. They’re ready to fire off their secret supply of missiles at targets all over Europe, the Middle East and the Indian Ocean to defend their insane dreams. Fortunately for the free world, McLanahan never takes no for an answer, even when it comes from the top, and before the Persians blow up the free world, McLanahan sends not only several Studs, but a handful of wonderful two-story-tall Tin Men—big, tough robots containing real live soldiers—to kick ass to Kingdom Qom.
Equal-opportunity employer Brown’s warrior gals achieve near parity with the gents, and there’s a cute Persian princess. Oh, and Russians.Pub Date: June 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-06-117310-3
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2007
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
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BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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