An engaging and often lively novel.
In Simon’s latest series thriller, two brothers take on a powerful neo-Nazi organization that uses stolen artificial intelligence in its quest for world domination.
Years ago, Alex Nicholas was gunned down while having dinner in a restaurant. However, thanks to artificial intelligence software that he helped to create, he finds a way to continue his existence in the cloud—as a realistic, nearly sentient facsimile of his living consciousness. His brother, Michael, now the head of Alex’s company, Tartarus, finds solace in this version of his brother and talks to him regularly through a computer interface. Unfortunately for the Nicholas brothers and for the rest of the world, Monsignor Kurt Schlegelberger and Claus Dietrich, members of the Neo-Nazi Free Forces Party, get hold of Alex’s technology and aim to use it to fulfill their goal to “finish what Adolf Hitler began.” Fortunately, the United States government enlists the help of Michael and Alex to stop them. Over the course of this action-packed story, Simon, the author of Death Logs Out (2019), employs prose that’s potent and detailed. He also seamlessly weaves in side plots, including one involving Michael’s former bodyguard/lover, which manage to work even when they’re not particularly necessary to the already busy story. Michael is the de facto protagonist, but Alex is more likely to pique readers’ interest. The chapters effectively veer among the actions of various players, from Michael and Alex’s conversations in Westport, Connecticut, to President Harry O’Brien’s conversations with his security team in Washington, D.C., to a hijacker’s actions as he commandeers a plane and aims to fly it into the White House. The plot does lose some momentum in the middle, however, as characters’ conversations become a bit repetitive.
An engaging and often lively novel.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 338
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: June 25, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A weird, wild ride.
Celebrity scandal and a haunted lake drive the narrative in this bestselling author’s latest serving of subtly ironic suspense.
Sager’s debut, Final Girls (2017), was fun and beautifully crafted. His most recent novels—Home Before Dark (2020) and Survive the Night (2021) —have been fun and a bit rickety. His new novel fits that mold. Narrator Casey Fletcher grew up watching her mother dazzle audiences, and then she became an actor herself. While she never achieves the “America’s sweetheart” status her mother enjoyed, Casey makes a career out of bit parts in movies and on TV and meatier parts onstage. Then the death of her husband sends her into an alcoholic spiral that ends with her getting fired from a Broadway play. When paparazzi document her substance abuse, her mother exiles her to the family retreat in Vermont. Casey has a dry, droll perspective that persists until circumstances overwhelm her, and if you’re getting a Carrie Fisher vibe from Casey Fletcher, that is almost certainly not an accident. Once in Vermont, she passes the time drinking bourbon and watching the former supermodel and the tech mogul who live across the lake through a pair of binoculars. Casey befriends Katherine Royce after rescuing her when she almost drowns and soon concludes that all is not well in Katherine and Tom’s marriage. Then Katherine disappears….It would be unfair to say too much about what happens next, but creepy coincidences start piling up, and eventually, Casey has to face the possibility that maybe some of the eerie legends about Lake Greene might have some truth to them. Sager certainly delivers a lot of twists, and he ventures into what is, for him, new territory. Are there some things that don’t quite add up at the end? Maybe, but asking that question does nothing but spoil a highly entertaining read.
A weird, wild ride.Pub Date: June 21, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-18319-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: March 29, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2022
As an adjunct member says, “You’re not a family, you’re a force.” Exactly, though not in the way you’d expect.
The ne’er-do-well son of a successful Irish American family gets dragged into criminal complications that suggest the rest of the Devlins aren’t exactly the upstanding citizens they appear.
The first 35 years in the life of Thomas “TJ” Devlin have been one disappointment after another to his parents, lawyers who founded a prosperous insurance and reinsurance firm, and his more successful siblings, John and Gabby. A longtime alcoholic who’s been unemployable ever since he did time for an incident involving his ex-girlfriend Carrie’s then 2-year-old daughter, TJ is nominally an investigator for Devlin & Devlin, but everyone knows the post is a sinecure. Things change dramatically when golden-boy John tells TJ that he just killed Neil Lemaire, an accountant for D&D client Runstan Electronics. Their speedy return to the murder scene reveals no corpse, so the brothers breathe easier—until Lemaire turns up shot to death in his car. John’s way of avoiding anything that might jeopardize his status as heir apparent to D&D is to throw TJ under the bus, blaming him for everything John himself has done and adding that you can’t trust anything his brother has said since he’s fallen off the wagon. TJ, who’s maintained his sobriety a day at a time for nearly two years, feels outraged, but neither the police investigating the murder nor his nearest and dearest care about his feelings. Forget the forgettable mystery, whose solution will leave you shrugging instead of gasping, and focus on the circular firing squad of the Devlins, and you’ll have a much better time than TJ.
As an adjunct member says, “You’re not a family, you’re a force.” Exactly, though not in the way you’d expect.Pub Date: March 26, 2024
ISBN: 9780525539704
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
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