by Steven P. Gregory ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 9, 2013
An uneven detective story with a memorable main character.
In this debut detective novel, a kidnapping case in Birmingham, Ala., forces a retired attorney into action.
High-profile lawyer Don Kramer asks Slate, his former colleague, to help him find his missing 19-year-old daughter. Slate, a beachside-bar owner, lives a quiet existence alone on a Gulf Coast houseboat, where he moved following traumatic events in his own life. He pilots his old private plane, the Albatross, to Birmingham and, almost immediately, a friend on the local police force informs him that a body was found with Slate’s business card in its pocket. From that moment on, Slate digs himself deeper into the case, building tenuous relationships with the police, the FBI and people close to Kramer’s family. Soon he uncovers links between them and a far-reaching oil and gas industry crime. Along the way, Slate’s past follows him like a shadow, informing his movements and coloring his sense of trust. Although he has some friends and connections, he remains palpably isolated, cups of coffee as his only companions. His lone-wolf attitude leaves him vulnerable, and as the story progresses, his long-term emotional trajectory becomes entwined with the case. However, the book’s imposing, rainy-season mood may be too heavy and slow-paced for some readers. Slate is a well-drawn protagonist, but most of the secondary characters lack the depth required to keep readers interested. Unlike more swiftly plotted crime novels that reach a crescendo before the final reveal, this story instead suddenly and unsatisfyingly drops off, promising to answer in a planned sequel the many questions left hanging. That said, Gregory’s prose is solid, and he vividly describes both the exterior Southern landscape and the insular, interior spaces Slate inhabits.
An uneven detective story with a memorable main character.Pub Date: July 9, 2013
ISBN: 978-0985992811
Page Count: 238
Publisher: Oak Mountain Press, LLC
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2006
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
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by J.D. Salinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 1951
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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