Pell writes with a sure, confident hand, the flame of the first page making it almost till the end.
Murder, blackmail and corporate greed give a newly promoted Scotland Yard chief inspector a run for his money in his first case in this investigative thriller where inaction is sometimes the best action.
Simon Craig had a good thing going as a marketing chief for an English steel manufacturer, but he wanted more. A “womanizing rogue,” Craig was a member of a shadowy cabal known as “the club,” a group of executives that illegally set steel prices among European Union steelmakers. He blackmails his former associates and, as insurance, entrusts a package of damning evidence with ex-flame and solicitor Susan Robson. To cover their tracks, the club torches Robson’s office and kills off Craig in the prologue. Craig, a serviceable McGuffin, is presented several times through flashbacks that show his flawed, preening personality but do little to further the plot; he’s best left dead and buried. Long-suffering widow Rachel lets Scotland Yard know Craig’s employers were sniffing around for paperwork—just the clue Randall needs to begin piecing the conspiracy together. Craig’s evidence survives, and Robson, along with another of his lovers, secretly plans to use it to punish the corporate criminals. As time runs out for Randall’s investigation, Craig’s death becomes moot as all involved sense there are bigger fish to fry; unfortunately, few of them make it to the pan. In a picturesque and well-described Europe, what ensues is a mad dash as club minions maneuver to keep their money and their employers safe and out of jail while Robson marshals her team amid mounting deaths. The prose is all business with few flashes of insight or wit, but it moves the story and characters along with economy and hardly any wasted words. Before a relatively lackluster denouement, the inventive plot and characters will keep readers focused and guessing at what intrigues are to come.
Pell writes with a sure, confident hand, the flame of the first page making it almost till the end.Pub Date: July 29, 2014
ISBN: 978-1496983060
Page Count: 238
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Review Posted Online: Sept. 17, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
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