A high-octane military thriller sure to pound the pulses of even seasoned adventure seekers.
A novel focuses on covert military operations in the harsh terrain of the Darién Gap.
When readers first encounter Dirk Lasher, he’s in a bad way. Running a dive bar in Florida, the former operative is reeling from the recent death of his beloved wife. As if fated, a young soldier, Capt. Benjamin Blake, shows up at the bar, telling Lasher and his compatriot Jack Williams that they’re needed for a mission that has gone belly up in the brutal jungles between Panama and Colombia. Though reluctant, both men are soon roped into the action, with Williams a week ahead as Lasher grieves stateside. Once Lasher acquaints himself with the personalities of the new special ops unit he’s joining, they’re loaded onto a plane bound for the jungle. Before they can land, they’re attacked by the rogue unit they’ve come to root out, and their plane crashes, wiping out everyone on board except for Lasher and a radio specialist, a young woman called Bonsai. As Bonsai and Lasher flee the scene of the crash, they’re rescued by—who else?—Williams and Blake. Chaos quickly erupts: The group is attacked again; Blake is killed; and it’s only Lasher’s quick thinking and deadly work with a hunting knife that prevent the rest of them from being gunned down. As the three survivors attempt to navigate the terrain and unravel the mystery of the rogue unit, Bonsai begins to fall for the enigmatic Lasher. While certain genre conventions do abound in Edward’s military thriller, such as the way female characters are often described in broad, physical strokes (“Bonsai was a fit twenty-six-year-old. She was tall for a female, about average height for a male, still the shortest of the four. Her face was narrow and her chin came almost to a point”), there is more than enough action and suspense here to keep readers flipping pages. In addition, the author offers an intriguing knife-wielding hero who just wants to complete his mission so he can go home and grieve. In this gripping, fast-paced series opener, some of the violence—much of which comes at the business end of a hunting knife—is brutal to get through, but is never gratuitous.
A high-octane military thriller sure to pound the pulses of even seasoned adventure seekers.Pub Date: July 27, 2024
ISBN: 9798334323599
Page Count: 306
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 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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