A long, exhilarating chase gloriously riddled with bullets and intrigue.
In Barrett’s (Breach of Power, 2013, etc.) latest thriller, a CIA operative becomes the unwitting protector of a man in Witness Security who’s targeted by a myriad of groups.
Gregg Kaplan’s plan to stay off the grid in Little Rock, Arkansas, doesn’t last long. The CIA agent helps stop a trio of thugs gunning for an old man and a law enforcement officer at a restaurant. Mortally wounded, the U.S. marshal asks Kaplan to protect the old man: Tony Napoli (an alias) in WitSec. As Kaplan and Tony race to a safe site, they’re pursued by unknown but undoubtedly armed men; Valkyrie, a notorious assassin; and Senior Inspector Pete Moss, a marshal called back to Arkansas from his recent Chicago transfer. But no matter how many times the two men switch vehicles, someone, somehow, seems to find them. Kaplan is determined to keep Tony—and himself—alive long enough to get some answers. Barrett’s briskly paced novel dives into the action and tackles exposition only when Kaplan and Tony are on the run. Even then, the narrative retains a high level of suspense by initially obscuring a few details. Tony, for instance, has certainly mingled with unsavory types, but that doesn’t explain what incriminating info he may be hoarding, who specifically hired Valkyrie, or how baddies persistently manage to track the men in an interstate pursuit. The book’s first half is its best, as Kaplan and Tony face all types of obstacles, including the leery WitSec witness trying to run off on his own and rednecks foolish enough to harass Kaplan when he’s having breakfast. Moss eventually catches up and, knowing nothing beyond Kaplan’s name, has to decide whether or not he can trust him. A later scene that sees Kaplan traveling out of the country feels too much like an offshoot; it’s a Kaplan-centric subplot that’s most effective if readers have read one of Barrett’s preceding novels in which the CIA operative appears. The ending, however, rounds out the solid story with some reveals, a mole or two, and a nice twist.
A long, exhilarating chase gloriously riddled with bullets and intrigue.Pub Date: May 19, 2015
ISBN: 978-0988506169
Page Count: 356
Publisher: Switchback Press
Review Posted Online: May 12, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
