A tale of an amateur detective who’s bright and riveting even when he makes mistakes.
A teenager with aspirations to be a police officer looks into the case of a missing woman in the latest, prequel installment of Greyson’s (Pure of Heart, 2015, etc.) thriller series.
Foster brothers Jack Stratton and Chandler Carter each have three months before they enlist in the Army, and they intend to follow their two years of service with stints in college and the Police Academy. Jack wants to enjoy his last summer, but financial analyst Stacy Shaw’s unexplained disappearance changes his plan. He doesn’t know her, but he does know “J-Dog,” aka Jay Martin, whom cops arrested after he admitted to finding the woman’s wallet. Although Jack and Jay, foster kids who grew up together, aren’t currently on friendly terms, their former foster mother, Aunt Haddie, enlists Jack’s help. He compiles a wide range of suspects, from a crazy, homeless man known as Vlad to Stacy’s lascivious boss, Leland Chambers. Fortunately, Chandler willingly sits with Jack during his stakeouts. Decidedly less fortunate is Detective Lyle Vargas, who believes that Jack is impeding a police investigation and threatens Jack’s future career by casually accusing him of crimes such as planting evidence. Jack will have to steer clear of the detective to solve the case, unless he’s prepared to wind up in prison with J-Dog. Despite the protagonist’s age, Greyson’s story isn’t in the young-adult genre. Jack is actually at the tail end of his teens, and this book chronologically takes place before a series featuring Jack as an adult detective. Greyson adeptly establishes Jack’s personal life while also reminding readers of the mystery; Jack’s date with a delightful young woman named Kelly, for example, begins with a news report about Stacy and later leads to the couple witnessing Jay’s arrest. The sound mystery brims with red herrings, and quite a few of Jack’s hunches miss the mark even though he bases his guesses on evidence. The book also shows Jack pragmatically investigating by perusing Facebook pages and doing old-fashioned footwork. The narrative explores darker territory—including drugs, prostitution, and possible murder—but doesn’t fully immerse itself in it, and there’s hardly any vulgar language aside from perhaps too many utterances of the word “crap.”
A tale of an amateur detective who’s bright and riveting even when he makes mistakes.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-68399-002-4
Page Count: -
Publisher: Greyson Media Associates
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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