A consummate thriller with some of the best characterization you’ll see all year.
In his engrossing thriller, Diamond (Impala, 2016, etc.) reminds readers that something as simple as a wrong turn can be the difference between life and death.
Whether in his first career as a boxer or his current one as a private investigator, Freddy Ferguson has always known to trust his instincts, the flares of warning that let him know something is very wrong. So when he’s flying home from San Francisco to D.C. and finds a woman in the security line piquing his interest, he’s sure she’s trouble, but he can’t help looking anyway. She appears to be unduly encouraged by two men to board a flight to Honolulu, but she deplanes at the last second, disguises herself, and hops a flight to Chicago. That, the bruises on her wrists, and the two men who made sure she got on the Honolulu flight would be enough to cause alarm. But when Freddy gets back to D.C. and learns that the Honolulu plane exploded over Santa Cruz, it’s clear why his instincts were triggered. When Freddy’s partner, Ed Hartwell, pulls him into the investigation, it doesn’t take the PI long to find out the woman’s name is Anna Brook and that she’s well-hidden. Just how deep the rabbit hole goes, Freddy can’t say. But he’s sure going to find out. The prose here is strong and solid, giving the reader an immediate sense of place and voice through Freddy’s first-person narration. Plus, it’s rare to see writing that so effectively blends action with characterization. Not only do readers have a crystal-clear vision of Anna right from the start, they’re also provided insight into Freddy’s dog-with-a-bone personality and sense of curiosity. That should be enough to hook most readers, but there are also breakneck twists and turns along with lots of backstory, particularly through flashbacks to Freddy’s past and his regrets.
A consummate thriller with some of the best characterization you’ll see all year.Pub Date: June 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9963507-6-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Stolen Time Press
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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