Capably written, consistently thrilling science fiction.
Biological terrorism forms the complex crux of Hiltz’s fast-paced, exhilarating debut.
A grisly opening chapter jumpstarts the action as the shadowy “Moone” and his henchmen survey—and set fire to—a village in southwest China that has been horrifyingly decimated by a flesh-eating disease and terrorized by mutated vermin. One year later, widower and Army veteran George Munson and his beautiful daughter Denny are getting settled in their new San Marino, Fla., home following the violent murder of beloved wife and mother Beth, back in Miami. Their safe, new life isn’t without complications; George’s secret, burgeoning love affair with neighbor Dawn Nichols rocks his already emotionally fragile daughter. His engaging career as a music engineer for an aging Latin pop star takes a back seat when a seemingly overnight influenza outbreak quickly quarantines the city. Returning home from vacation, young friends Jim, Eric, Manny and Manny’s girlfriend Kara are ordered to stay inside. Impatient hero George, however, sneaks out and vigorously interrogates a FEMA operative who reveals the “flu” epidemic is actually a man-made, highly contagious, lethal “genetic retrovirus,” the antidote of which is unavailable to the general public. Knowing they’ve all been infected, George leaves his family in search of the cure. Putting his former Army surveillance experience to good use, he stealthily sneaks onto top-secret military property, stumbles upon a germ warfare lab full of human and animal medical experiments testing, among other variations, the “Red Death #13” microbe, and desperately searches for the antivirus. Meanwhile, the Jim, Eric, Manny and Kara converge with Denny and Dawn in an effort to escape the crazed, bloodthirsty zombies that have seemingly taken over San Marino. Hiltz’s forceful narrative aptly powers George’s race against time as the virus spreads globally and his daughter is kidnapped by evil kingpin Moone in the rousing conclusion. Though scenes involving the four youths have a rushed, underdeveloped quality, Hiltz’s writing ability is promising and his creative imagination sets the stage for further high-tension adventures.
Capably written, consistently thrilling science fiction.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2010
ISBN: 978-1456352301
Page Count: 310
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
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