A cerebral, fast-paced thriller.
Fewston (co-author: Vanity of Vanities, 2011, etc.) delivers an atmospheric and evocative thriller in which an American government secret agent must navigate fluid allegiances and murky principles in 1970s Tehran.
Levi Fiske’s job is to “get a handle” on Iranian Farrokh Bakr. Bakr’s export business selling military weapons and priceless artifacts doesn’t raise much of an eyebrow, but the same can’t be said for his fiery writing directed against the shah. Unfortunately for Fiske, Bakr is slippery. Worse, the assignment comes with two lovely distractions—Leila and Dorri Bakr—Bakr’s glamorous daughters. Besotted by Leila and batting away at teenager Dorri’s unexpected, if not entirely unwelcome, advances, Fiske becomes a little too invested in the Bakr family’s fortunes. This is an uncomfortable turn of events for a hero who is as enigmatic and tortured as Fiske. Haunted by his past in Vietnam, where he had another persona as John Lockwood, the secret agent blames himself for a fellow soldier’s death in the Mekong Delta, and his survivor’s guilt looms large as he once again negotiates life and death under different circumstances. Equally problematic is the terrain: “This is the Middle East,” Fiske’s CIA mentor reminds him, “If you cannot comprehend that when someone says up they mean down, or they direct you left when you’re supposed to go right, you are already lost.” Quite. The question then becomes whether Fiske will find terra firma when he eventually stands on his own. Even if key plot details are sometimes cloaked under too many layers of subterfuge, the reader becomes invested in Fiske’s survival. The evocative prose, narrated in the first person by Fiske, animates Tehran and the countryside. Regarding the Shahyad Aryamehr Monument, he says: “The Iranian monument loomed above us as we emerged, as if from a short intense dream, from the heated snugness of the vibrant taxi and out into the cold air.” The novel is bookended by a few engaging short stories.
A cerebral, fast-paced thriller.Pub Date: March 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-61296-500-0
Page Count: 284
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
Review Posted Online: July 9, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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