Anyone interested in a good mystery along with insights into marine life will enjoy D’Avanzo’s latest.
Mystery writer D’Avanzo (Demon Spirit, Devil Sea, 2017, etc.) is back on the coast of Maine, dealing with a bunch of lobstermen who want no truck with nosy outsiders.
In the very first chapter, marine biologist and amateur sleuth Mara Tusconi discovers a body under her cousin Gordy Maloy’s mussel aquaculture raft, a body that had belonged to lobsterman Buddy Crawford. Whodunit? Mara soon finds herself on Macomeck Island, a speck in the Gulf of Maine about 25 miles off the coast. Lobstermen have lived on the island for generations, and something akin to the law of the frontier holds sway. Mara, who is fighting her own demons of loneliness and insecurity, finds comfort in grandmotherly Abby Burgess. Abby’s daughter Patty, Gordy’s girlfriend, is sure that the killer is hotheaded Tyler Johnson, reputed druggie. But Mara keeps sniffing around and uncovering old wounds, grudges, and hatreds. There are also very vivid scenes such as a near catastrophe when a sudden squall threatens to swamp Mara’s sea kayak. Pushing on, she begins to recover from her own wounds (some self-inflicted), and the final episode in a submersible with her old flame, Ted McNight, may just put her life back on course. It should also be mentioned that her best confidant is a lobster named Homer, (who of course is very discreet). D’Avanzo writes well (“The knots in my stomach would have made a sailor proud”) and delivers a nice mix of Mara’s outer challenges (who killed Buddy?) and inner (will she ever find love?). She also delivers a lot of very interesting facts about oceanography and marine biology, having earned a Ph.D. from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. That alone is worth the read. She switches to dialect when she deems it appropriate (“lobstah,” “habah,” “remembah”). Some readers may find this charming; others may find it a bit tiresome and distracting. This installment contains a preview of her next Mara Tusconi mystery, Glass Eels, Shattered Sea (2019).
Anyone interested in a good mystery along with insights into marine life will enjoy D’Avanzo’s latest.Pub Date: June 25, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63381-136-2
Page Count: 210
Publisher: Maine Authors Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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