A spy tale with an intriguing premise that’s bogged down by ill-defined conspiracies and one-note characters.
In Blaine’s mystery-thriller, a veteran of the first U.S.-Iraq war is recruited to spy on a Paris-based artist’s cult.
It’s the 1990s, and Amadeo Effscott—not his real name—is a 20-something informant for the United States government, which is investigating the possible terrorist activities of charismatic artist Sean Dorian Knight. The novel is presented as a series of classified documents allegedly recovered in the real-life 2022 FBI search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. In a series of accounts to French police, person-of-interest reports, and dispatches from Amadeo’s handler, readers learn that the informant is torn between his allegiance to the United States and his feelings of genuine friendship for the people in Dorian’s secretive American Renaissance organization. Much of his attachment to the latter seems to stem from his sexual obsession with poet and artist Lilah al-Hazara, a member of Dorian’s inner circle. Amadeo also appears to be suffering from the effects of traumas incurred during his military service in Iraq, which his handler exploits and that may also be affecting his reliability—as an agent and as a narrator. Although he’s tasked with killing Dorian, he tries to reform the leader, instead. Blaine’s novel has a compelling setup. However, readers will find that the details of the cult’s operations are rather fuzzy, largely because Amadeo himself gets lost in a fog of conspiracies disseminated by government agents and potential terrorists. Also, several characters feel underdeveloped, aside from their most basic function in the plot. However, the rumors that Amadeo encounters have a diverting religious overtone: Several main characters come from Muslim backgrounds, and, according to Effscott’s handler, the cult’s central lore involves a “Muslim Jesus” figure. In an additional twist for American literature aficionados, the story is laced with allusions to F. Scott Fitzgerald, including Effscott’s cover name, the presence of a character called the “Sheik of Araby”—a song quoted in The Great Gatsby (1925)—and even the author’s pseudonym (and Effscott’s real name), which references the protagonist of This Side of Paradise (1920).
A spy tale with an intriguing premise that’s bogged down by ill-defined conspiracies and one-note characters.Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9781960142337
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Manhattan Book Group
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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