A one-of-a-kind sport that’s too torrid to satisfy as a thriller and too cockamamie to be erotic.
Uruguayan novelist and classics professor Chavarría turns from his scholarly studies of the origins of prostitution to a contemporary lab in his translation-into-English debut, the cat-and-mouse tale of a bicycle whore in post-Soviet Havana.
If there’s one thing Alicia wants, it’s not to be poor. So when Gorbachev turns a cold shoulder on his North American comrades, putting an end to her studies at the university, she makes a careful assessment of her assets—golden-blond hair, perky breasts, irresistible behind—then puts them on careful display on a secondhand bike. Her lovingly detailed technique is so foolproof that soon the house that she shares with her mother, Margarita, is filled to bursting with gifts from her new friends (the two ladies are too proud and independent to accept cash). Alicia, in fact, never takes money with her and never eats anywhere but home—until she meets Victor King, trade representative for a firm of Dutch treasure hunters who talks like Pancho Villa and looks like Mel Gibson. He’s so handsome that Alicia agrees to have dinner at his elegantly furnished home, where she and he have every kind of sex Chavarría hasn’t already catalogued. Alicia thinks she’s got it made; she’ll become mistress to this gorgeous hunk and never have to pedal the streets of Havana again—except that King wants her not for himself but for his wife, Elizabeth, who can only become aroused when she watches others. So Alicia agrees to put on well-paid shows for Victor and Elizabeth, copulating enthusiastically with a variety of men and the occasional knickknack—until King ups the ante once again, involving her in a kidnap plot that will either make her rich or ruin her.
A one-of-a-kind sport that’s too torrid to satisfy as a thriller and too cockamamie to be erotic.Pub Date: June 1, 2001
ISBN: 1-888451-16-5
Page Count: 245
Publisher: Akashic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
A treasure trove of Victoriana, especially for foodies. More history than mystery but a truly delightful read.
A split-second decision is life-changing in this stand-alone Victorian-era mystery from Bowen (Love and Death Among the Cheetahs, 2019, etc.).
Isabella Waverly’s father is an aristocrat estranged from his family who’s fallen so far in the world that he sent his oldest daughter out to work as a servant at 15. Her only joy is learning to cook. When a girl is run over by an omnibus before her eyes, Bella automatically picks up an envelope the dead girl had been clutching. The envelope contains an invitation to apply for an under-cook position at Buckingham Palace that very day. Introducing herself as Helen Barton, Bella snags the job. She hides her new position from Louisa, the younger sister who’s marrying the son of a well-off family. She struggles to immerse herself in the persona of a girl from Yorkshire, explaining her upper-class accent by saying her father was a gentleman. The only fly in the ointment is the appearance of Helen’s brother, who blackmails her into finding a job for him, too. Bella’s passion for cooking and her work ethic soon endear her to the mostly male staff. Queen Victoria, who has an enormous appetite for rich foods, so enjoys Bella’s scones that she personally asks her to make them every day. When her majesty travels to Nice, Bella goes along and gets to put her knowledge of French to use. She develops a semiromantic friendship with the head chef at the hotel, which was built especially for the queen. Indeed, her life seems idyllic until Count Wilhelm, the betrothed of Princess Sophie, dies, ostensibly from a poisoned mushroom Bella bought in a local market. Now she must juggle cooking and a suddenly active love life as she searches for a way to end her predicament.
A treasure trove of Victoriana, especially for foodies. More history than mystery but a truly delightful read.Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5420-0825-9
Page Count: 348
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
In Donlea’s skillful hands, this story of obsession, murder, and the search for truth is both a compassionate character...
Forensic reconstructionist Rory Moore knows her odd quirks and obsessive habits are a strength when she’s re-creating a crime, but when she investigates a 40-year-old serial-killer case, even she isn’t sure she can handle what she’s uncovering.
Rory works for the Chicago Police Department, reconstructing homicides. She’s so good at her work that Detective Ron Davidson not only tolerates her preferences (no touching, little eye contact, minimal social interaction), but allows her frequent breaks to recover from her total immersion in her work. One day Davidson asks Rory to meet with the father of a murdered young woman. Rory’s calming hobby is repairing china dolls, and the father wants his daughter’s doll repaired as a memento. But as Rory explores the woman’s murder, she gets pulled into the case of The Thief, a suspected serial killer who murdered young women in Chicago in 1979. Then, after Rory’s attorney father dies, she finds that he had been representing The Thief, who is about to be paroled. Alternating in time, the story follows Angela Mitchell, a woman with autism who becomes obsessed with studying the murders in 1979; and, in 2019, Rory, as one discovery leads to more surprises and questions. Donlea (Don’t Believe It, 2018, etc.) so vividly describes the tension the two women feel that the reader stays tense, too, as the stories escalate. He's also so careful about describing his characters' particularities that neither woman is portrayed as bizarre (although the people around them may think they are) but rather highly intelligent, tormented women determined to find the truth.
In Donlea’s skillful hands, this story of obsession, murder, and the search for truth is both a compassionate character study and a compelling thriller.Pub Date: May 28, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4967-1381-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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