A page-turning thriller with enough emotional heft to keep readers intrigued until the last line.
In Cuban’s novel, a down-and-out former lawyer searches for answers about his girlfriend’s sudden death.
Jason Feldman is an erstwhile attorney in long-term addiction recovery working as a security guard in a Pittsburgh department store. He hates the boss (a former cop) he works under, and he’s been professionally disgraced—Jason was disbarred after lying to the FBI during a murder investigation in which he was, at first, the prime suspect—but he is slowly putting his life back together while he waits for his suspended law license to be reinstated. The main thing keeping him together is his girlfriend Emily, another former addict and current employee of an organization that aims to help those affected by drugs. When Emily turns up dead in her own home, the police suspect an overdose, but Jason and Emily’s best friend, Delaney—an ER doctor and also Emily’s roommate—think it is nearly impossible that she has relapsed. It just so happens that the detective in charge of the investigation, Jeanette Keane, is the same person who put the squeeze on Jason years ago during the investigation Jason obstructed. When the autopsy reveals a fentanyl overdose, Jason is still skeptical—all the more so when Emily’s former employer begins hounding him, offering a preposterous cash reward for her company-owned electronics (which have gone missing). As Jason scrambles for more information and tries to convince Delaney he wasn’t involved in Emily’s relapse, he notices he’s being followed by a mysterious crew-cut man in a black Lexus. Cuban’s protagonist is richly drawn, and readers will find themselves sympathizing with his success-turned-self-sabotage-turned-recovery arc, especially in moments when he laments his lost relationship with his son. While there are some descriptions that misfire (“the blemish-free skin and rectangular facial structure are a cross between Halle Berry and Rosario Dawson”), Cuban’s prose is generallysolid enough to keep readers moving through his well-plotted and compelling narrative.
A page-turning thriller with enough emotional heft to keep readers intrigued until the last line.Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9798888451588
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Post Hill Press
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Soapy, suspenseful fun.
A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.
Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.
Soapy, suspenseful fun.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227325
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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