A World War I veteran with no job and no prospects is invited to a tony Surrey housewarming by a man who claims to be the best friend of his late father. If this sounds too good to be true, it is, in spades.
Shortly after arriving at Thrackley together with Freddie Usher, his equally idle but much wealthier chum, Jim Henderson realizes he has an unusual distinction among the half-dozen weekend guests. Marilyn Brampton writes grim sex novels; her husband, Henry, is a painter of some note; Catherine Lady Stone is a pillar of useless philanthropic organizations; the one-named Raoul is a featured dancer in the West End production Soft Sugar; and Freddie is the languid possessor of some first-class diamonds. All the other guests invited by Edwin Carson, an accomplished gemologist who talks of nothing but his passion, are awash in precious stones; only Jim is stone broke. So why has Jim, who can’t remember ever seeing Carson before in his life, been invited to round out the party—unless Freddie is right and Carson’s goal is to find an unemployed husband for Mary, his attractive daughter? After pages and pages of upper-class blather over breakfast and bridge, a tête-à-tête in which Carson casually mentions where he and Jim’s father first met strikes a false note Jim squelches but doesn’t have the wit to pick up on, and it’s not until he recognizes one of Carson’s servants as someone he’s seen before that the country-house trappings fall away and Melville (Quick Curtain, 2017, etc.) switches abruptly to florid, and considerably less convincing, melodrama.
Even so, Melville’s debut, originally published in 1934, goes far to bear out the wisdom of the guest who complains, “I hate these harmless, potty people. They’re always up to something.”Pub Date: Aug. 7, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4642-0971-0
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2018
Categories: HISTORICAL FICTION | MYSTERY & DETECTIVE | HISTORICAL MYSTERY
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Thriller writer Baldacci (A Minute to Midnight, 2019, etc.) launches a new detective series starring World War II combat vet Aloysius Archer.
In 1949, Archer is paroled from Carderock Prison (he was innocent) and must report regularly to his parole officer, Ernestine Crabtree (she’s “damn fine-looking”). Parole terms forbid his visiting bars or loose women, which could become a problem. Trouble starts when businessman Hank Pittleman offers Archer $100 to recover a ’47 Cadillac that’s collateral for a debt owed by Lucas Tuttle, who readily agrees he owes the money. But Tuttle wants his daughter Jackie back—she’s Pittleman’s girlfriend, and she won’t return to Daddy. Archer finds the car, but it’s been torched. With no collateral to collect, he may have to return his hundred bucks. Meanwhile, Crabtree gets Archer the only job available, butchering hogs at the slaughterhouse. He’d killed plenty of men in combat, and now he needs peace. The Pittleman job doesn’t provide that peace, but at least it doesn’t involve bashing hogs’ brains in. People wind up dead and Archer becomes a suspect. So he noses around and shows that he might have the chops to be a good private investigator, a shamus. This is an era when gals have gams, guys say dang and keep extra Lucky Strikes in their hatbands, and a Lady Liberty half-dollar buys a good meal. The dialogue has a '40s noir feel: “And don’t trust nobody.…I don’t care how damn pretty they are.” There’s adult entertainment at the Cat’s Meow, cheap grub at the Checkered Past, and just enough clichés to prove that no one’s highfalutin. Readers will like Archer. He’s a talented man who enjoys detective stories, won’t keep ill-gotten gains, and respects women. All signs suggest a sequel where he hangs out a shamus shingle.
Archer will be a great series character for fans of crime fiction. Let’s hope the cigarettes don’t kill him.Pub Date: July 9, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5387-5056-8
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 14, 2019
Categories: GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE | HISTORICAL FICTION | SUSPENSE | SUSPENSE
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FBI Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast finds evil afoot in his latest action-filled adventure (Verses for the Dead, 2018, etc.).
Imagine Florida beachcombers’ shock when they discover a shoe with a severed foot inside. Soon they see dozens more feet, all in identical shoes, bobbing toward the beach. Police and FBI ultimately count more than a hundred of them washing up on Sanibel and Captiva Islands' tranquil shores. Pendergast teams up with the junior Special Agent Armstrong Coldmoon to investigate this strange phenomenon. Oceanographers use a supercomputer to analyze Gulf currents and attempt to determine where the feet entered the ocean. Were they dumped off a ship or an island? Does each one represent a homicide? Analysts examine chemical residues and pollen, even the angle of each foot’s amputation, but the puzzle defies all explanation. Attention focuses on Cuba, where “something terrible was happening” in front of a coastal prison, and on China, the apparent source of the shoes. The clever plot is “a most baffling case indeed” for the brilliant Pendergast, but it’s the type of problem he thrives on. He’s hardly a stereotypical FBI agent, given for example his lemon-colored silk suit, his Panama hat, and his legendary insistence on working alone—until now. Pendergast rarely blinks—perhaps, someone surmises, he’s part reptile. But equally odd is Constance Greene, his “extraordinarily beautiful,” smart, and sarcastic young “ward” who has “eyes that had seen everything and, as a result, were surprised by nothing.” Coldmoon is more down to earth: part Lakota, part Italian, and “every inch a Fed.” Add in murderous drug dealers, an intrepid newspaper reporter, coyotes crossing the U.S.–Mexico border, and a pissed-off wannabe graphic novelist, and you have a thoroughly entertaining cast of characters. There is plenty of suspense, and the action gets bloody.
Great storytelling, a quirky hero, and a quirkier plot make this a winner for adventure fans.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5387-4725-4
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Jan. 13, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
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