Sufficiently gripping and intricate to excuse the slow reveal.
Corruption and the disappearance of a former student bring a growing sense of unease to a college town in Brookhouse’s novel.
Lenny Grey is a student, “when he can afford it.” He attends Prester, located in Prester, North Carolina, and considered one of the most prestigious private colleges in the South. He has only a few courses to complete before being handed an English degree, but he’s struggling to find the funds to graduate despite working side jobs as a waiter and handyman. As a prizewinning essayist, he is asked by the college to tutor student athletes. The school has a history of not admitting “more than the token Black,” but an exception is made for Wallace Wallace, a basketball star who struggles academically. Lenny is unofficially tasked with writing Wallace’s papers—in other words, cheating. In addition to racism and corruption, Prester is also dogged by the disappearance of Haley Flagg, a college dropout. After a private detective is hired and the town is found to be a font of unsavory activity, none of its citizens is beyond suspicion. The prose is an urgent machine-gun rattle of short, precise, descriptive sentences: “Home again. Maisie’s Bug was behind the trailer. Lenny lifted the tarp.” This sense of immediacy is tempered by occasional passages of ponderous, atmospheric prose: “Once upon a time seasonal darkness relieved only by the thin flame of a candle provided opportunity for contemplation and ruminating on the baffling questions of mortality.” The plot unfolds at a leisurely pace—perhaps too leisurely for some readers. The unrushed narrative provides opportunities to get to know some of the oddball townsfolk the author has created, such as the controversial artist Zephyr Harrison, who is paid to paint some young girls: “If Daddy wanted prim purity and the sloe-eyed family spaniel, he should have commissioned someone else.” Drawing upon this cast of strange, psychologically convincing characters, Brookhouse cleverly pulls back the skin of small-town America to reveal deeply rooted racism and multiple layers of sleaze. The story is unpredictable, throwing in a delicious plot twist that will keep readers guessing until the end.
Sufficiently gripping and intricate to excuse the slow reveal.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 9781734499520
Page Count: 190
Publisher: Safe Harbor Books
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.
Dead bodies turn up in the first sentence of the prologue in McFadden’s latest domestic thriller.
The mystery of who died is at the pulsating heart of this propulsive tale. As Chapter 1 begins, Naomi arrives home to find the locks changed on the front door of the gorgeous home she shares with her husband, Jeremy, and their 5-year-old son, Teddy. Jeremy steps out the front door and convinces Naomi to move out while he has their home renovated, a plan Naomi knows nothing about. It’s all a ruse, though, as the next day Jeremy tells her he wants a divorce. Naomi is shellshocked and soon discovers that Jeremy is having an affair with Veronica, a beautiful younger woman. What seems at first like a stereotypical story about a man who leaves his wife turns into something else when Naomi decides she’ll do anything to get Veronica away from Jeremy and Teddy, and Veronica decides to fight for what she thinks she deserves. Fans of stalker novels will cringe with delight as creepy things start to happen. Teddy’s stuffed elephant, a gift from Veronica, is found impaled on a kitchen knife; Naomi suspects Jeremy is gaslighting her and that Veronica tried to poison her. A weird confrontation among Jeremy, Veronica, and Naomi at Teddy’s birthday party, to which Naomi shows up uninvited, is priceless. There are three main characters, and any or all of them may be unreliable narrators. Packing the plot with dark, gasp-inducing twists, McFadden outdoes herself in a story about how highly emotional people engage in risky behavior to get what they want—but in this novel, for better or worse, not everyone will survive.
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249631
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK TO SCREEN
The best news: The year goes on long enough for the hero to be reinstated. Whew!
Maine game warden Mike Bowditch’s 34th year proves to be his most eventful ever.
It begins when Mike, newly demoted from investigator, sees flames half a mile away and rushes into a burning house, where he’s too late to rescue Jenna Malloy or her husband, gym owner Brian. The only survivor is a baby girl Mike finds in the arms of a neighbor, Karen Kershaw. Waldo County Sheriff’s Deputy Chet Bessel’s reaction to the tragedy tells Mike the deaths won’t be widely mourned. They’re not the only ones that won’t. Soon afterward, the discovery of Axl Deming’s body on the railroad tracks suggests that whoever killed the presumed rapist and murderer of teenager Emily Crockett is bent on vigilante justice. Since the victims are “two of the most hated people in Maine—three if you count Jenna Malloy,” suspects would seem to be everywhere. Mike, repeatedly warned off the case because he’s no longer an investigator, can’t resist focusing on Karen Kershaw, who fled the scene while he was questioning her, and Edward Gudgeon, a scallop diver who frequented the same bar as Axl and his ex-con brother, Shayn. Mike’s on the right track, but his quest will take a twisty route through many more ambushes, confrontations, brushes with fellow law officers who end up suspending him, and threats to his wife, EMT Stacey Stevens, and their newborn son, Charles. Doiron tightens this web with an insistent mastery that will keep most readers from noticing just how far-reaching it is until they’ve gained the end and can take some deep, cleansing breaths.
The best news: The year goes on long enough for the hero to be reinstated. Whew!Pub Date: June 30, 2026
ISBN: 9781250864451
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Minotaur
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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