bookshelf

WHERE FOOLS DARE TO TREAD

Name: WHERE FOOLS DARE TO TREAD
Author: David William Pearce
ISBN: 978-1-68433-203-8

A MONK BUTTMAN MYSTERY

by David William Pearce ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 21, 2019

A tangled but engrossing mystery populated by dynamic characters.

bookshelf

In this debut thriller, a California courier becomes immersed in a conspiracy of greed, missing persons, and powerful individuals who view murder as an occasional necessity.

Monk Buttman is simply delivering a couple of messages one day for the law firm Aeschylus and Associates. But on returning to the law office, he witnesses a murder and the killer leaving with a bag containing $25,000. Marsyas Durant, who works at the firm, asks Monk for discretion so the courier only tells the authorities he found the body. Durant then enlists Monk to track down the culprit, as the money taken was intended for A and A’s client Johnny Dulcimer. Monk teams up with Dulcimer’s associate Mr. Jones and also looks into the unexplained disappearance of Martin Delashay, another A and A client. It’s abundantly clear dangerous people are somehow involved, as two goons attack Monk. But what exactly they’re after is a mystery the protagonist struggles to unravel, though it may be greed; one theory suggests possible money laundering at Delashay’s software company, Sphere. Monk soon fears that the next time someone assaults him, the encounter will be more lethal than a beating. Meanwhile, he further complicates his life by juggling potential relationships with his neighbor Joanie; Dulcimer’s receptionist, Agnes; and Delashay’s wife, Judith. In this mystery series opener, Pearce’s plot is unquestionably convoluted, including the reason Durant asks Monk to investigate. But Monk’s first-person perspective is an easy-to-follow narrative, adequately keeping in check the novel’s copious characters. He’s likewise an intriguing protagonist with a curious backstory, most notably the fact that his father, Moses, runs a commune. There’s even an extended sequence with Monk and Agnes that deftly delves into both of their thorny pasts. But the book does run a bit too long, as it puts the mystery on the back burner just prior to the final act. Still, the author sublimely illustrates quieter moments throughout the story: “The sun, omnipotent and persistent, drove me from my fitful slumber and my comfy bed. I saw no reason to get up.”

A tangled but engrossing mystery populated by dynamic characters.

Pub Date: Feb. 21, 2019

ISBN: 978-1-68433-203-8

Page Count: 308

Publisher: Black Rose Writing

Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2019

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

bookshelf

DISTANT SHORES

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2002

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...

bookshelf

Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.

After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).

Pub Date: July 1, 2002

ISBN: 0-345-45071-X

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WOMEN
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FOUR WINDS
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE GREAT ALONE
by Kristin Hannah

bookshelf

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

bookshelf

A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.