An intriguing but uneven spy tale.
A comic espionage novel reimagines two famous art curators as wartime spies.
Hitler has risen to power in Germany, and America’s Public Hero No. 1, J. Edgar Hoover, suspects that the Nazi dictator is sending spies to the United States disguised as avant-garde artists. In order to sniff out the spy ring, Hoover seeks out two women known for discovering (and bedding) the finest artists in New York City: Baroness Hilla Rebay and Peggy Guggenheim. “We’ll put you through our Counter-Spy Training Program and you’ll learn how to smash Nazi spy rings,” Hoover’s subordinate and lover, Clyde Tolson, pitches them. “Publicity should be good for your museums’ images. Nothing wrong with making a buck.” The only problem? These two high-society women have an intensely personal rivalry that makes it difficult for them to be in the same room without literally punching each other in the nose. Hoover brokers peace between the heiresses for the sake of the country, and the two of them are soon serving the FBI as a dynamic duo aligned against America’s greatest enemies, including Hitler, Stalin, the Japanese, and various traitorous forces at work within the country’s borders. Soon, they are operating undercover at Nazi meetings, tailing spies, and preventing presidential assassinations on the floor of Congress. Along the way, they meet fellow masters of espionage like the handsome but chauvinistic Agent X-9; British spy Jonquil “Junk” Bond (father of James); and a pair of “Special Agent Super Sluts” named Bambi and Knockers. But do the two protagonists have what it takes to save the homeland from the most dangerous Soviet spy the FBI has ever come up against—a man known only as “the Pigeon”?
The inventive premise suggests a fun thriller set in the art world of the 1940s, and the prose is richly inflected with arresting details. But ultimately, this is a farce, replete with broad sex jokes, thin characters, and a ton of slapstick. (In the very first scene, Hilla flips Hoover over her shoulder for pointing his gun at her. He then slips on multiple banana peels.) Powers does not make much of an effort to render the historical characters recognizable in any way. Everyone is extremely horny, very violent, and speaks in the same gangster movie banter. Here, Guggenheim explains the Equal Rights Amendment to X-9: “ ‘Whaddya mean, an Equal Rights Amendment?’ a belligerent X-9 demanded. ‘It means that us gals get everything you guys get. We can do anything you can do and do it better, and we can go anywhere you go.’ ‘Ya mean ya want to go to the can with us?’ ” What’s more, the story is exceedingly episodic, and it is not until the final chapter that the author ties the various plotlines together. Given the extreme vintage of the humor and the book’s 410-page length, many readers will struggle to get to the end.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2023
ISBN: 9781604893397
Page Count: 412
Publisher: Livingston Press
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Although it lacks the surgical precision of Slaughter’s very best nightmares, this one richly earns its title.
More than a decade after a Georgia man is convicted of a monstrous double murder, an uncomfortably similar crime frees him and resets the search for the guilty party.
In Clifton County, home to the Rich Cliftons and the other Cliftons, the disappearance of teens Madison Dalrymple and Cheyenne Baker during the Halloween festivities hits everyone in North Falls hard. Working with her father, Sheriff Gerald Clifton, Deputy Emmy Lou Clifton hears the clock ticking down as she races frantically to get leads on the two friends, who’d been secretly plotting to take off for Atlanta after some undisclosed big score. As a longtime friend of Madison’s mother, Hannah, Emmy hopes against hope to find the missing teens before they’re both dead. By the time Emmy’s hopes are dashed, two unpleasantly likely suspects with strong attachments to underage sex partners have emerged, and one of them ends up in prison. In a bold move, Slaughter jumps over the next 12 years to the case of Paisley Walker, a 14-year-old whose disappearance catches the eye of retiring FBI criminal psychologist Jude Archer, who promptly crosses the country to come to Clifton County and take charge—um, that is, consult—on this heartrending new investigation. Emmy, suddenly and shockingly deprived of counsel from the parents who’ve supported her all her life, doesn’t get along any better with Jude than with the larger circle of Cliftons and the Clifton-Cliftons. But together they identify one new suspect, then another, before a shootout that arrives so early you just know there are still more surprises to come.
Although it lacks the surgical precision of Slaughter’s very best nightmares, this one richly earns its title.Pub Date: Aug. 12, 2025
ISBN: 9780063336773
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2025
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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