An understated but sublime mystery with series potential.
A woman uses guile and her psychic ability to try to unmask the secret organization responsible for her best friend’s death in this debut thriller.
Housesitting for her grandmother is bringing back memories for architectural engineer Elizabeth Grant. On the night her best friend, Loralie Carter, disappeared seven years ago, Elizabeth saw her pal beaten and bloody in a vision. Elizabeth has since had nightmares and apparent hallucinations, which her family attributes to a mental condition. But Madame “Netty” Antoinette visits Elizabeth at her grandmother’s Mississippi home and says Loralie, who’s sadly dead, is worried about her friend. Evidently, both Netty and Elizabeth have psychic abilities, though the latter is repressing hers. Netty’s visit catches the attention of White supremacist group The Society for a Restored America, whose General believes Loralie stashed incriminating evidence that Elizabeth now hides. The organization, which indeed killed Loralie, goes to frightening lengths to maintain its secret, 150-year existence. Luckily, Elizabeth has allies, from Netty’s FBI nephew, Malcom Alexander, to Philadelphia reporter Juanita Alvarez, who’s investigating someone’s possible attempt to incite a race war. Elizabeth also receives spectral assistance, namely Loralie, and uses her own wits to try to bring down a group with members in powerful positions, including in the government. Abbot takes her time establishing characters, which makes for an unhurried pace as well as a dynamic cast. For example, whip-smart Juanita and her hacker colleague (and former convict) Heath Grayson practically solve a relevant Philadelphia murder on their own. Society members, meanwhile, are indisputable villains, preaching hatred and spewing racial slurs. They’re definitely menacing, as they watch, follow, and even attack Elizabeth. The author incorporates Elizabeth’s paranormal gift subtly, to the point that it’s not very helpful. But it’s an ability she can use to greater effect in the sequel, which the ending suggests is forthcoming. Despite knowing the story’s killer from the beginning, the final act boasts memorable twists.
An understated but sublime mystery with series potential. (author bio)Pub Date: Aug. 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-9990318-7-2
Page Count: 392
Publisher: Blazing Sword Publishing Ltd.
Review Posted Online: Oct. 9, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.
Another sweltering month in Charlotte, another boatload of mysteries past and present for overworked, overstressed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.
A week after the night she chases but fails to catch a mysterious trespasser outside her town house, some unknown party texts Tempe four images of a corpse that looks as if it’s been chewed by wild hogs, because it has been. Showboat Medical Examiner Margot Heavner makes it clear that, breaking with her department’s earlier practice (The Bone Collection, 2016, etc.), she has no intention of calling in Tempe as a consultant and promptly identifies the faceless body herself as that of a young Asian man. Nettled by several errors in Heavner’s analysis, and even more by her willingness to share the gory details at a press conference, Tempe launches her own investigation, which is not so much off the books as against the books. Heavner isn’t exactly mollified when Tempe, aided by retired police detective Skinny Slidell and a host of experts, puts a name to the dead man. But the hints of other crimes Tempe’s identification uncovers, particularly crimes against children, spur her on to redouble her efforts despite the new M.E.’s splenetic outbursts. Before he died, it seems, Felix Vodyanov was linked to a passenger ferry that sank in 1994, an even earlier U.S. government project to research biological agents that could control human behavior, the hinky spiritual retreat Sparkling Waters, the dark web site DeepUnder, and the disappearances of at least four schoolchildren, two of whom have also turned up dead. And why on earth was Vodyanov carrying Tempe’s own contact information? The mounting evidence of ever more and ever worse skulduggery will pull Tempe deeper and deeper down what even she sees as a rabbit hole before she confronts a ringleader implicated in “Drugs. Fraud. Breaking and entering. Arson. Kidnapping. How does attempted murder sound?”
Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9821-3888-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
The youngest Ryans will please fans of the genre.
The U.S. president’s son lands in the middle of a West African coup in this latest Clancy thriller.
Kyle Ryan is part of a three-man Defense Intelligence Agency team covertly installing cyber communications in Luanda, Angola. His two colleagues are murdered, and he must “run or die.” The Naval Academy grad isn’t a warrior like his older brother, Jack Junior, who sits out this story. President Ryan doesn’t even know his son is in Africa, let alone how much trouble Kyle is in. Then the unit of Navy Lieutenant Commander (and big sister) Katie Ryan gets the call to rescue Americans as an Angolan man, Victor Baptista, tries to overthrow the current democratically elected president. “Fear was the most powerful weapon in Angola,” and Baptista inspires a great deal of it. Too bad for him that the Ryan family never knuckles under to fear. Captured, hooded, and in danger of execution, Kyle has a steadfast bravery that reflects the Ryan DNA. Baptista doesn’t realize at first that among his American prisoners is President Ryan’s son. Oops. Well, with U.S. warships fast approaching Angolan shores, he thinks he can strike a deal with the “fickle and feckless Americans.” A more tuned-in advisor lets Baptista know that President Ryan will never negotiate, even with his son’s life on the line. So this isn’t just the United States the terrorist is dealing with, but the Ryan family. Katie and Kyle use their intelligence, not brute force, while a pissed-off papa bear wields his awesome executive power from the White House. Meanwhile, Baptista’s murderous cruelty leaves his aides and lackeys trembling in fear. This novel looks like Katie and Kyle’s debuts as central characters, and they are Ryans through and through—they run toward trouble, and they have no faults worth mentioning. Parental and filial loyalty mix well with the action and add interest to an otherwise standard (but good) Clancy thriller.
The youngest Ryans will please fans of the genre.Pub Date: Nov. 25, 2025
ISBN: 9780593718063
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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