A woman on the run ponders the nature of humanity as she lives through the end of the world.
Readers have gleefully suffered through the End of Days in a good many apocalyptic novels in recent years. Whether it’s zombies in World War Z, robots in Roboapacalypse or vampires in The Passage, writers suffer no shortage of inventive ways to kill us off. What debut novelist Adams brings to the scene in a planned trilogy is an unhinged but disquietly clear perspective on survivor’s guilt and the grimy nature of humanity. “It’s not just college grades that fall in a curve,” observes 30-year-old American refugee Zoe. “Human decency is bell-shaped, with some of us slopping over the edges.” Adams ramps up our end days in an increasingly horrifying amplification of events: a Chinese intervention of cellular technology; weather modification experiments gone awry; and a DNA-warping virus that halves the population at an astonishing rate. Zoe is making her way across Europe, hoping to book passage on a boat to Greece, but it’s hard traveling, especially when she discovers she’s pregnant. She and a young companion are beset by bands of predators and are stalked by a shadowy figure dubbed “The Swiss,” a murderous abortionist driven by a startling secret. With uncommon confidence, Adams flips back and forth between the present day and Zoe’s life before. She dreams of a container of horrors straight out of the Pandora myth, pieces together the (naturally) man-made origins of the plague and recounts her relationship with Nick Rose, her therapist. Adams has an excellent sense of timing, delivering gasp-inducing moments that punctuate her nightmare with verve. But it’s Zoe’s clear-eyed sense of self-preservation that will keep readers waiting for Adams’ follow-up. The novel relies heavily on biblical and Greek myths to welcome readers to Zoe’s nightmare, but it’s a small price to pay for the jolt.
Pub Date: April 10, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4516-4299-5
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Emily Bestler/Atria
Review Posted Online: March 6, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
Reid’s tightly crafted tale toys with the nature of identity and comes by its terror honestly, building a wall of...
A road trip in a snowstorm takes a sinister turn for a man and his girlfriend, the novel’s unnamed narrator.
Reid’s preternaturally creepy debut unfolds like a bad dream, the kind from which you desperately want to wake up yet also want to keep dreaming so you can see how everything fits together—or, rather, falls apart. The narrator, known only as the girlfriend, is driving with her beau, Jake, a scientist, to meet his parents at the family farm. The relationship is new, but, as the title implies, she’s already thinking of calling it quits. Jake is somewhat strange and fond of philosophizing, though the tendency to speak in the abstract is something that unites the pair. The weather outside turns nastier, and Reid intercuts the couple’s increasingly tense journey with short interstitial chapters that imply a crime has been committed, though the details are vague. Matters don’t improve when Jake and the narrator arrive at the farm, a hulking collection of buildings in the middle of nowhere. The meeting with her potential in-laws is as awkward as it is frightening, with Reid expertly needling the reader—and the narrator—into a state of near-blind panic with every footfall on a basement step. On the drive back, Jake makes a detour to an empty high school, which will take the couple to new heights of the terrifying and the bizarre.
Reid’s tightly crafted tale toys with the nature of identity and comes by its terror honestly, building a wall of intricately layered psychological torment so impenetrable it’s impossible to escape.Pub Date: June 14, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2692-5
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scout Press/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 15, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2016
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Chavez delivers a fraught if flawed page-turner that attempts too many twists.
A good Samaritan incurs a psychopath’s wrath in this debut thriller.
Veterinarian Cassie Larkin is heading home after a 12-hour shift when someone darts in front of her car, causing her to dump her energy drink. As she pulls over to mop up the mess, her headlights illuminate a couple having a physical altercation. Cassie calls 911, but before help arrives, the man tosses the woman down an embankment. Ignoring the dispatcher’s instructions, Cassie exits the vehicle and intervenes, preventing the now-unconscious woman’s murder. With sirens wailing in the distance, the man warns Cassie: “Let her die, and I’ll let you live.” He then scrambles back to the road and flees in Cassie’s van. Using mug shots, Cassie identifies the thief and would-be killer as Carver Sweet, who is wanted for poisoning his wife. The Santa Rosa police assure Cassie of her safety, but the next evening, her husband, Sam, vanishes while trick-or-treating with their 6-year-old daughter, Audrey. Hours later, he sends texts apologizing and confessing to an affair, but although it’s true that Sam and Cassie have been fighting, she suspects foul play—particularly given the previous night’s events. Cassie files a report with the cops, but they dismiss her concerns, leaving Cassie to investigate on her own. After a convoluted start, Chavez embarks on a paranoia-fueled thrill ride, escalating the stakes while exploiting readers’ darkest domestic fears. The far-fetched plot lacks cohesion and relies too heavily on coincidence to be fully satisfying, but the reader will be invested in learning the Larkin family’s fate through to the too-pat conclusion.
Chavez delivers a fraught if flawed page-turner that attempts too many twists.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-293617-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
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