A competent crime thriller.
Miller (Nectar of the Gods, 2015, etc.) returns with a novel about a builder who becomes embroiled in the dangerous, duplicitous world of organized crime.
Max Dietrich, the director of construction for a flailing building company in the Poconos, isn’t too surprised when a bullet sails through his office window and breaks his mug of tequila. His boss, Joe, is a greedy, inept businessman whose mismanagement of the company has left him unable to properly pay his workers. As Max explains to the police when they come to investigate the shooting, “This company owes money to every subcontractor we have in the entire county. Counties.” Max himself would have left months ago if it didn’t mean walking away from all the back pay he’s owed—as well as his co-worker Laurie, whose recent divorce has left her more receptive to Max’s advances. When they find out that Joe is planning to develop the previously off-limits Black Mountain—a last-ditch deal that could net the company millions—Max hopes that things might finally turn around. That is, until he discovers that Joe’s new business partners are connected to New York City’s most dangerous mob family. Max tries to be pragmatic about the situation; after all, there’s a lot of money to be made. But when mob business practices start to penetrate their Pocono town, he must decide where his loyalties lie. Miller is a capable writer; his prose has no frills (and a few typos, such as “then” for “than”), but he’s skilled at quick characterization and exposition. The dank, backwater setting in the not-so-nice Poconos adds a grittiness to the work that doesn’t feel manufactured. If the book falters, it’s because it’s a bit too concerned with the intricacies of the construction business; for example, it initially spends a lot of time on the flaws of Joe’s business model—a subject that may not interest many readers. Things pick up a bit, though, after unsavory types start to show up, and the novel works well enough to keep readers invested until the end.
A competent crime thriller.Pub Date: April 11, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5084-7999-4
Page Count: 278
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 2, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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