Entertaining and insightful crime stories.
In this follow-up collection, Dean (Cruel and Unusual, 2017, etc.) delivers four speculative tales centered on a near future American criminal justice system and its harrowing outcomes.
The book kicks off with “Dummy,” which follows two auto mechanics, Robert Holman and Juan Ortega, who are hoping for a relaxing night of drinks. They drive home drunk, resulting in an accident that kills an innocent woman; one of the men survives and goes on trial for vehicular homicide, among other charges, and if convicted, he’ll face a truly startling punishment. Indeed, all four of these Arizona-set stories showcase new, offbeat ways to render judgment. In “Early Release,” inmate Kelvin Heyer, a lifer, has a chance to get out of prison, but thanks to the Victims’ Rights Amendment, the family of the man he killed during a botched bank robbery gets to hunt him for 24 hours. Like all the stories here, this one offers multilayered characters; although Heyer is the one serving time for murder, it’s the vengeful, homicidal family members who come across as villains. In “Public Pool,” Luis Ortiz and Carlos Noriega’s small company wins a bid to build eight new swimming pools in Phoenix; a competitor’s attempt to pilfer their business leads to blackmail and murder—as well as a very curious method for extracting a confession. A woman fights a traffic ticket in “Broken Justice” and learns that the cutting-edge, automated “courtroom pods” may have terrifying flaws. Each story is swiftly paced; in the aforementioned “Early Release,” for instance, the protagonist spends much of the narrative on the run. But Dean’s stories also provide profound critical assessments of capital punishment—executions are expedited, or broadcast on the Justice Department’s website. They also offer critiques on contemporary technology; “Public Pool,” for instance, makes it clear that people should be very wary of what they include in texts.
Entertaining and insightful crime stories.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-72886-349-8
Page Count: 348
Publisher: Time Tunnel Media
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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