Clarke has written over a hundred short stories, most of which have been anthologized before. But these are his twenty-five favorites and they combine to make fine reading. The title story is quietly remarkable as Tibetan monks complete their life's work with the aid of a computer and The Star also makes an unsettling comment on religion. The others range from the tall fantasy tales from the White Hart to the Superiority of Clarke's views on certain kinds of progress (this story has been required reading for one MIT course). Clarke is a contented "prophet with a small p." The reader will find much to entertain...and challenge.
Pub Date: May 3, 1967
ISBN: 0848821815
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Harcourt, Brace & World
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1967
An unremarkable kickoff to a new series by Day, who writes other cozies under several bylines (Death Over Easy, 2018, etc.)....
Cozy mystery book club members try their hands at solving a real-life murder.
Mackenzie Almeida is on her way home from a book club meeting when she stumbles over the body of Jake Lacey. Mac’s boyfriend, baker Tim Brunelle, appears moments before the police arrive, and new police chief Victoria Laitinen, her old high school classmate, is suspicious when Mac admits to having had words with Jake over a bad roofing job earlier in the day. Even worse, the murder weapon, a knife plunged into Jake’s neck, appears to be her half brother Derrick’s custom fishing knife. Although Mac doesn’t mention this last fact to Victoria, she soon realizes that she may have to plow any skills she picked up from reading mysteries into solving one. When Derrick proves elusive, she tries to track him down despite the problems she’s having at her bike shop. Mechanic Orlean Brown is showing up late or not at all, and Derrick, who helps out, is still missing. So her grandmother offers to work in the shop while she’s out hunting for clues. Her book club friends pitch in, using group email to keep in touch. The amateurs turn up a young woman who looked happy before Jake’s murder and sad afterward along with a high-powered real estate agent from California Mac overhears talking about a mysterious deal. But the summer season brings so many strangers to Cape Cod that it’s hard to sift through them for Jake’s killer. Derrick finally turns up after fighting a losing battle with his alcoholism, but Mac, certain that he’s innocent, continues to investigate, earning several death threats and the realization that finding a killer is a lot harder than it appears in her books.
An unremarkable kickoff to a new series by Day, who writes other cozies under several bylines (Death Over Easy, 2018, etc.). Pleasant characters and local color just aren’t enough.Pub Date: Dec. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4967-1506-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2018
The revenge of a cellphone-hater.
King’s apocalyptic cautionary tale suggests that cellular communication could be as pernicious as it is pervasive.
Artist Clay Riddell has just traveled from his native Maine to Boston to sell his first graphic novel when all hell breaks loose. Vehicles crash at random. Language turns to gibberish. Bystanders devour the flesh of strangers. As King (From a Buick 8, 2002, etc.) describes this urban meltdown in gory, graphic detail, it becomes increasingly obvious to Riddell that all who have suddenly become crazy were talking on their cell phones. Some sort of simultaneous transmission has transformed the city’s citizenry into mindless zombies. The author taps into the collective dread of a society battered by 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina as he depicts a battle for survival that pits “normies” such as Clay, the few who didn’t have cellular access, against hordes of “phoners,” who quickly develop a flocking instinct and telepathic communication. The plot can’t sustain the sizzle of its sensational opening: More concerned with the effects of this cell-phone terrorism than its cause, the author never indicates what’s happening beyond Clay’s immediate vicinity. Yet the hero’s odyssey remains compelling as he attempts to return home to estranged wife Sharon and beloved son Johnny, and the surrogate family of refugees he attracts along the way adds a human dimension. Clay doesn’t have a cell phone, but his son does, and he has no idea in what form he might find Johnny if he manages to find the boy at all. As King acknowledges in his dedication, he owes a debt to zombie-flick director George Romero and horror/fantasy author Richard Matheson.
The revenge of a cellphone-hater.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2006
ISBN: 0-7432-9233-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2006
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