An often enjoyable but uneven mix of romance, domesticity, and action.
What starts as a typical self-empowerment novel about a family attempting to start a new life in Hawaii after tragedy takes some unexpected noirish turns midway through.
Two years after her husband Paul’s drowning in Oregon, Welsh-born Lindsey Hill moves with her three children to Hawaii, where she’s purchased a motel—sight unseen—with life insurance money that's finally been paid out after Paul's surfing death was ruled accidental. Still grieving Paul, Lindsey is also contending with the chaos his financial failures caused in the months before he died. Sloan writes about the entire family with energy, insight, and humor (like the physical comedy surrounding the aged Crown Victoria that Lindsey rents the first day, crashes before exiting the rental agency’s parking lot, and ends up buying). Of course the Mau Loa Motel turns out to be beautiful but more run-down than Lindsey expected; of course she is emotionally numb until a handsome stranger shows up and helps with repairs while stirring her heartstrings; of course 14-year-old Olivia has trouble adjusting to high school until she meets a boy and his brother, while 7-year-old animal lover Sena is uber-precocious and 12-year-old Carlos is a sensitive pleaser who covers his own pain while protecting the others. Slowly they start recovering in all the conventional ways before Sloan shifts gears to include elements of crime fiction. Unfortunately, the plotting, while less predictable than a standard domestic dramedy, becomes more stilted as the male characters, who never quite gel, take prominent roles. It turns out that the men in Lindsey’s life have not always been what they seem, a truth her children figure out before she does. A raging storm bearing down on the motel with everyone inside becomes the novel’s piece de resistance and raises the stakes for everyone involved, including readers, before a disappointingly easy denouement.
An often enjoyable but uneven mix of romance, domesticity, and action.Pub Date: May 9, 2023
ISBN: 9781250847300
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.
A love story about a life of second chances.
In Nassau, in the Bahamas, casino detective Vincent LaPorta grills Alfie Logan, who’d come up a winner three times in a row at the roulette table and walked away with $2 million. “How did you do it?” asks the detective. Alfie calmly denies cheating. You wired all the money to a Gianna Rule, LaPorta says. Why? To explain, Alfie produces a composition book with the words “For the Boss, to Be Read Upon My Death” written on the cover. Read this for answers, Alfie suggests, calling it a love story. His mother had passed along to him a strange trait: He can say “Twice!” and go back to a specific time and place to have a do-over. But it only works once for any particular moment, and then he must live with the new consequences. He can only do this for himself and can’t prevent anyone from dying. Alfie regularly uses his power—failing to impress a girl the first time, he finds out more about her, goes back in time, and presto! She likes him. The premise is of course not credible—LaPorta doesn’t buy it either—but it’s intriguing. Most people would probably love to go back and unsay something. The story’s focus is on Alfie’s love for Gianna and whether it’s requited, unrequited, or both. In any case, he’s obsessed with her. He’s a good man, though, an intelligent person with ordinary human failings and a solid moral compass. Albom writes in a warm, easy style that transports the reader to a world of second chances and what-ifs, where spirituality lies close to the surface but never intrudes on the story. Though a cynic will call it sappy, anyone who is sick to their core from the daily news will enjoy this escape from reality.
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780062406682
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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