An earnest story of a modern-day church miracle that’s hampered by awkward execution.
Kenney’s novel tells a story of hard luck and unexpected renewal in Hollywood.
Jimbo Jackobee is suddenly fired from his job as a lackluster teacher at Calhoun Middle School. Meanwhile, an alcoholic priest known as Father Dan no longer feels his calling and merely goes through the motions at St. Barnaby’s in Hollywood (“he had been winging it for years waiting for his judgment day,” readers are told. “When it came, he hoped God was lenient and spared him any more humiliation”). Jimbo, fearing that his wife, Sadie, will kick him out of their Hollywood Hills home, takes a job with her brother, Ziggy, selling vacuum cleaners door to door. At the same time, Father Dan is presented with an ultimatum by Bishop Monahan: Fill the declining church with parishioners, or the diocese will shut it down, just like it closed the adjacent St. Barnaby’s Elementary School. In short order, the two main characters find each other; Father Dan hires Jimbo as a kind of all-purpose church assistant, and Jimbo starts to feel a deep personal connection with St. Barnaby’s, which he sees as being “as screwed up as he was.” As they form half-baked schemes to save St. Barnaby’s, the men form a friendship based on shared humility, as they’re both facing possible catastrophe. However, when Jimbo’s cupidity forces Father Dan to fire him, the former takes up with the pastor of a rival church. The narrative is filled with quips, one-liners, and a zany kind of upbeat energy that keep things engaging. As the story goes on, Kenney manages to keep the unlikely plot twists coming, which involve some sexual escapades, although the broad strokes of the book’s final act are predictable. Also, the book would have significantly benefited from a stronger edit; there are numerous typos (such as “she decided to buy a machine point black”), missing punctuation, and slip-ups; for instance, “Suck It Up Vacuums,” the name of Ziggy's company, switches to “Suck Em Up Vacuums” later in the book without explanation.
An earnest story of a modern-day church miracle that’s hampered by awkward execution.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: Feb. 25, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The story unfolds so irresistibly that newcomers may think Grisham’s been writing thrillers like this his whole life.
What hasn’t legendary legal eagle Grisham tried yet? How about a thriller about serial kidnapping and international terrorism.
When Paul and Chelsea Tanner disappear during a day trip on their Paris honeymoon, their abductors demand a ransom of $2 million from Chelsea’s wealthy parents, and a few days later the same sum from Paul’s much less well-heeled parents. After orthopedist Lowell Clayburn, Chelsea’s father, ponies up the ransom without breathing a word to the authorities, his daughter is promptly released. But even though Paul’s parents sell their home, liquidate their assets, and borrow money from the Clayburns to meet the kidnappers’ demands, the villains hold on to Paul anyway. Asked whether he’s ever seen such an outcome in a double kidnapping, FBI deputy director Andrew Strong tells Lowell: “No, this is a new one.” But it’s not, as Strong knows all too well; it’s the third such active case, all involving honeymooning couples whose bridegrooms had served in the armed forces. After masterfully drawing readers in with his bare-knuckle account of the Tanners’ abduction and the attempt by their families and the CIA to tell the lies required to keep caring friends and the rapacious press at bay, Grisham effortlessly switches gears to follow CIA agent Rae Claire Russo and Stuart Nash, a former Department of Justice prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay who agrees to marry her so they can serve as bait for the kidnappers, whose motives include justice and revenge as well as cold hard cash. So much for the imprisoned Paul’s wistful reflection that “hopefully, it was only about money.”
The story unfolds so irresistibly that newcomers may think Grisham’s been writing thrillers like this his whole life.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2026
ISBN: 9780385550543
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2026
Brilliant, affecting work from one of contemporary literature’s masters.
A phone call from her past disrupts the tenuously reconstructed life of a concert pianist turned farmer’s wife.
We know from the beginning that Livia Cable is the battered survivor of her brother Cyrus’ death by suicide, a devastating romance, and a career-ending injury. Only 11 when Cyrus stepped in front of a train, she was already marked out as different in her rural Tennessee hometown by her extraordinary musical ability. The siblings had huddled together against their angry mother’s frequent beatings, and Livia still feels abandoned by Cyrus years later, when she picks up the phone to hear the voice of Sigurd, the fiery labor organizer she loved and lost to “the revolution” while on scholarship at the Indiana University School of Music. Now married to kind, steady childhood friend Charlie, Livia looks back on her affair with Sigurd as she struggles to deal with the recent death of her mother, a compulsive hoarder who left a house stuffed with junk to be disposed of and bitter memories that haven’t faded over time. Kingsolver skillfully juggles the two time frames to unravel Livia’s complicated feelings about the life she lost when her right hand was crushed and the life she has now as a country piano teacher. A partita, she explains to Sigurd early on, “is a composition made of a lot of parts with a lot of different moods…the artist’s work is to make them all add up to something that feels whole.” That’s precisely what Kingsolver does in this beautifully paced and judged narrative, which builds to revelations uncovered amid the piles of trash in Livia’s childhood home about the reasons for Cyrus’ suicide (clearly foreshadowed) and their mother’s rage (startling and heartbreaking). A fierce belief that great art is for everyone joins Kingsolver’s familiar preoccupations with class distinctions, social injustice, and the complex bonds of family and community in a tender denouement.
Brilliant, affecting work from one of contemporary literature’s masters.Pub Date: Oct. 6, 2026
ISBN: 9780063577541
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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