An engrossing, thorny whodunit set in a small town with big secrets.
In Kaufman’s mystery, a former New York City cop moves to a small village, where he’s soon embroiled in a friend’s murder case.
Queensbridge, Massachusetts, is a peaceful town—“a tiny Berkshire village” that its new chief of police, Caleb Crane, and his wife, Rachel, hope will be a quiet change of pace. They’re integrating themselves into the new community, setting down roots, and trying unsuccessfully to have a child. When Rachel’s best friend, Mary Jane Bennett, announces her own pregnancy, Rachel can’t help but feel jealous—but does her envy run deep enough to murder her best friend? That’s the question her husband must consider after Mary Jane is found dead at home, strangled by her own scarf in what’s quickly ruled an accident—an experiment with autoerotic asphyxiation gone wrong. Caleb doesn’t think she’d have taken such a risk, nor does he think she might have killed herself on purpose—but who wanted her dead? Kaufman writes in a close third-person perspective that occasionally breaks into Caleb’s internal monologue. The author quickly lays out the clues and potential murder suspects, who include Mary Jane’s seemingly innocent lawyer and environmentalist husband; her ornery, conservative father, who disapproves of his daughter’s choice of partner; Mary Jane’s close friend, who happens to appear on crutches the day after Mary Jane’s death; and an outcast who recently returned to his hometown looking for redemption. Kaufman also expertly spools out small details as Crane digs deeper into the case. The mystery is further enhanced by a running throughline about the story of Purim, and the recurring notion that things are rarely as they appear to be. It later becomes clear that Mary Jane’s death was not only a murder, but also that some of the suspects may be next on the killer’s list, and readers will be eager to get answers. Overall, the narrative is judiciously paced and shows Kaufman’s ear for realistic dialogue, and it will keep readers guessing until the final reveal.
An engrossing, thorny whodunit set in a small town with big secrets.Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: March 11, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.
Best friends confront feelings for each other when they take a honeymoon trip together.
Francesca Gardiner and George Saint James have always been best friends—just like Jo and Laurie from Little Women, which they both love. Frankie has a big, complicated family and George was the boy next door who’d moved in with his eccentric grandmother. Their friendship survived childhood, awkward teenage years, and living together as young adults without ever venturing into the romantic—well, except for one kiss, but they don’t talk about that. When Frankie gets engaged to an older professor named Nate, George isn’t happy and a huge fight ensues. Despite his misgivings, George shows up to be her best man, but Nate leaves Frankie right before the wedding with only a cryptic letter. Devastated, Frankie goes to a friend’s house to recuperate, but her honeymoon is already planned and paid for—so she decides to travel to Tofino, a picturesque town on the coast of Vancouver Island, with George taking Nate’s place. Frankie wants to fix her friendship with George, but now that they’re in a romantic suite in a beautiful location, things are more complicated than ever. She’d always thought a relationship would be a bad idea, but she’s slowly beginning to realize they’ll never be able to go back to being kids. Maybe the only way forward involves forging a new kind of relationship. Fortune, the author of romances like This Summer Will Be Different (2024), returns with another love story full of longing and intense angst. The many allusions to Little Women are charming, and Frankie is a delightfully headstrong, feisty character. She and George have explosive chemistry, and Fortune manages to make the “will-they-or-won’t-they” nature of their relationship feel like life-or-death stakes.
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9780593953242
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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