This novel, like its brutal characters, remains rough around the edges.
An average Joe who thinks he deserves much more turns to crime to get it.
In Moore’s debut novel, quick-tempered Ike Caudine smokes too much, swears too much, and thinks far too highly of himself to be the lowly billboard salesman that he is. Two years later, in 1997, he and longtime friend Fitzgerald “Fritz” Moeller start a real estate magazine in moneyed Connecticut. The magazine quickly and wildly succeeds, allowing Ike to wear Gucci, drive a Mercedes, and flaunt a Rolex. But the publication and the big paycheck it provides are short-lived, killed by the internet and Ike and Fritz’s lack of business acumen. Eight years later, Ike’s toiling as a receptionist at a management firm and living with Mary. Raised poor, she now regularly wears pearls and wants a home in which “to entertain.” Realizing being with Ike isn’t going to get her a house with a porte-cochere, she packs up and leaves. Ike reunites with Fritz, who has turned to drugs and crime. Fritz baits Ike, whom he calls “monkey man,” into joining him in a money-laundering scheme. Fritz suggests the plan will bring Ike enough cash to lure back Mary. In the meantime, Ike encounters other willing women. Some unsavory male cohorts, one of whom is known as Fishguts, populate what the one-time publisher euphemistically refers to as the “finance” business, a line of work that transforms Ike into a killer. The novel’s arc takes Ike from being a rookie salesman who only imagines maiming a disagreeable prospective client to being a thug who feels “alive” after killing. Ike is nasty, surrounded by characters of a similar nature and in whom readers may well not have a rooting interest. There’s also the gratuitous use of “fuck,” with the word appearing on 79 of the book’s 259 pages, often more than once on a page. There’s also a palpable, un-PC attitude revealed by the overuse of another F word—“fat”—to describe people; there’s the “fat man whose suit pants bulged,” the “fat woman with a gold tooth,” etc. A banker and Connecticut native, the author writes authoritatively about money laundering and the Greenwich locale. In addition, dialogue, though often disturbing and repetitive, can be strong.
This novel, like its brutal characters, remains rough around the edges.Pub Date: Dec. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5197-8474-2
Page Count: 236
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 25, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.
Another reboot of Jane Austen?!? Hadlow pulls it off in a smart, heartfelt novel devoted to bookish Mary, middle of the five sisters in Pride and Prejudice.
Part 1 recaps Pride and Prejudice through Mary’s eyes, climaxing with the humiliating moment when she sings poorly at a party and older sister Elizabeth goads their father to cut her off in front of everyone. The sisters’ friend Charlotte, who marries the unctuous Mr. Collins after Elizabeth rejects him, emerges as a pivotal character; her conversations with Mary are even tougher-minded here than those with Elizabeth depicted by Austen. In Part 2, two years later, Mary observes on a visit that Charlotte is deferential but remote with her husband; she forms an intellectual friendship with the neglected and surprisingly nice Mr. Collins that leads to Charlotte’s asking Mary to leave. In Part 3, Mary finds refuge in London with her kindly aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner. Mrs. Gardiner is the second motherly woman, after Longbourn housekeeper Mrs. Hill, to try to undo the psychic damage wrought by Mary’s actual mother, shallow, status-obsessed Mrs. Bennet, by building up her confidence and buying her some nice clothes (funded by guilt-ridden Lizzy). Sure enough, two suitors appear: Tom Hayward, a poetry-loving lawyer who relishes Mary’s intellect but urges her to also express her feelings; and William Ryder, charming but feckless inheritor of a large fortune, whom naturally Mrs. Bennet loudly favors. It takes some maneuvering to orchestrate the estrangement of Mary and Tom, so clearly right for each other, but debut novelist Hadlow manages it with aplomb in a bravura passage describing a walking tour of the Lake District rife with seething complications furthered by odious Caroline Bingley. Her comeuppance at Mary’s hands marks the welcome final step in our heroine’s transformation from a self-doubting wallflower to a vibrant, self-assured woman who deserves her happy ending. Hadlow traces that progression with sensitivity, emotional clarity, and a quiet edge of social criticism Austen would have relished.
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-12941-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
© Copyright 2026 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.
