by Carla Buckley ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 4, 2014
Despite its high concept, the plot never rises to a temperature above lukewarm.
Yes, everybody has secrets in Buckley’s third novel (Invisible, 2012, etc.), about an Ohio woman who will go to any lengths to protect her impaired son, but some secrets are uglier than others.
Fourteen-year-old Tyler suffers from xeroderma pigmentosum, a genetic condition that means he must avoid any exposure to the sun or any UV light. He stays in his room all day, but he likes to sneak out at night and photograph his neighbors through their windows, capturing their secrets. Tyler’s ferociously protective mother, Eve, has devoted her life to caring for Tyler, whose chances for surviving into adulthood are slim. Absorbed in her concern for Tyler, Eve pays little attention to Tyler’s 15-year-old sister, Melissa, who is going through an adolescent rough spot. Nor does Eve have any patience or empathy for her husband, David, who commutes from their Ohio neighborhood to his job in Washington, D.C., to support them all, given Tyler’s extra expenses. One rainy August evening, Eve rushes to the airport to pick up David (who is having his own professional and personal crises). Her attention wavers while texting, and she hits something: Amy, the 11-year-old daughter of Eve’s best friend, Charlotte. After a moment of horror when she realizes Amy is dead, Eve resolves not to own up and take responsibility. After all, who would care for Tyler if she went to prison? Once Amy is declared missing, then dead, suspicion falls everywhere but on Eve, who struggles intermittently with her guilt even while she offers emotional support to Charlotte. The dialogue between the two—and between Eve and David when they’re not at each other’s throats—is often blandly chirpy. As for Eve’s neighbors’ secrets, they are pretty low-grade as secrets go.
Despite its high concept, the plot never rises to a temperature above lukewarm.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-345-53524-5
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: Dec. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
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by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 6, 2018
A tour de force.
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New York Times Bestseller
In 1974, a troubled Vietnam vet inherits a house from a fallen comrade and moves his family to Alaska.
After years as a prisoner of war, Ernt Allbright returned home to his wife, Cora, and daughter, Leni, a violent, difficult, restless man. The family moved so frequently that 13-year-old Leni went to five schools in four years. But when they move to Alaska, still very wild and sparsely populated, Ernt finds a landscape as raw as he is. As Leni soon realizes, “Everyone up here had two stories: the life before and the life now. If you wanted to pray to a weirdo god or live in a school bus or marry a goose, no one in Alaska was going to say crap to you.” There are many great things about this book—one of them is its constant stream of memorably formulated insights about Alaska. Another key example is delivered by Large Marge, a former prosecutor in Washington, D.C., who now runs the general store for the community of around 30 brave souls who live in Kaneq year-round. As she cautions the Allbrights, “Alaska herself can be Sleeping Beauty one minute and a bitch with a sawed-off shotgun the next. There’s a saying: Up here you can make one mistake. The second one will kill you.” Hannah’s (The Nightingale, 2015, etc.) follow-up to her series of blockbuster bestsellers will thrill her fans with its combination of Greek tragedy, Romeo and Juliet–like coming-of-age story, and domestic potboiler. She re-creates in magical detail the lives of Alaska's homesteaders in both of the state's seasons (they really only have two) and is just as specific and authentic in her depiction of the spiritual wounds of post-Vietnam America.
A tour de force.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-312-57723-0
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Oct. 30, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2017
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by Lisa Jewell ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 24, 2018
Dark and unsettling, this novel’s end arrives abruptly even as readers are still moving at a breakneck speed.
Ten years after her teenage daughter went missing, a mother begins a new relationship only to discover she can't truly move on until she answers lingering questions about the past.
Laurel Mack’s life stopped in many ways the day her 15-year-old daughter, Ellie, left the house to study at the library and never returned. She drifted away from her other two children, Hanna and Jake, and eventually she and her husband, Paul, divorced. Ten years later, Ellie’s remains and her backpack are found, though the police are unable to determine the reasons for her disappearance and death. After Ellie’s funeral, Laurel begins a relationship with Floyd, a man she meets in a cafe. She's disarmed by Floyd’s charm, but when she meets his young daughter, Poppy, Laurel is startled by her resemblance to Ellie. As the novel progresses, Laurel becomes increasingly determined to learn what happened to Ellie, especially after discovering an odd connection between Poppy’s mother and her daughter even as her relationship with Floyd is becoming more serious. Jewell’s (I Found You, 2017, etc.) latest thriller moves at a brisk pace even as she plays with narrative structure: The book is split into three sections, including a first one which alternates chapters between the time of Ellie’s disappearance and the present and a second section that begins as Laurel and Floyd meet. Both of these sections primarily focus on Laurel. In the third section, Jewell alternates narrators and moments in time: The narrator switches to alternating first-person points of view (told by Poppy’s mother and Floyd) interspersed with third-person narration of Ellie’s experiences and Laurel’s discoveries in the present. All of these devices serve to build palpable tension, but the structure also contributes to how deeply disturbing the story becomes. At times, the characters and the emotional core of the events are almost obscured by such quick maneuvering through the weighty plot.
Dark and unsettling, this novel’s end arrives abruptly even as readers are still moving at a breakneck speed.Pub Date: April 24, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-5464-5
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2018
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