A smart, suspenseful novel that masterfully intertwines medicine, mystery, and morality.
Edwards’ medical thriller combines hospital politics, cybercrime, and the chilling return of a serial killer.
In 2018, Jack Forester, a dedicated physician and medical school dean at New Canterbury University, is already struggling with the loss of his wife and the overwhelming responsibilities of running a hospital when his world is upended. A financial crisis threatens to bankrupt the medical center, and as Jack investigates, he uncovers shocking mismanagement and possible fraud. His pursuit of the truth puts him at odds with powerful figures, including a ruthless cybercriminal with a vested interest in the hospital’s collapse. At home, Jack is a single father to a young daughter, Julia, who’s beginning to ask difficult questions about her mother whom she barely remembers. Meanwhile, his teenage niece, Kaitlyn, arrives in his care under difficult circumstances, offering him a challenge and an unexpected source of strength. Just as Jack begins to untangle the web of deception surrounding the hospital, his past returns to haunt him. A notorious serial killer with whom Jack has history is back, and this time, he’s targeting those closest to him. Edwards, a physician, crafts an authentic medical setting, from the daily pressures of emergency medicine to the behind-the-scenes power struggles that shape hospital operations. His attention to detail, such as the protocols of hospital administration and the psychological burden of caregiving (“What would she remember of her childhood? He hoped it wouldn’t be of the hours she spent wondering when he would come home”), lends the story credibility and depth. Jack is a compelling protagonist—flawed yet determined, battling personal grief and forced into roles he never sought. Kaitlyn, a rebellious but intelligent teenager with a hidden talent for baseball, adds emotional weight to the story, and their evolving relationship is one of the book’s most rewarding aspects. Julia, though younger, serves as a constant reminder of the life that Jack’s trying to hold together, making the stakes more personal. The tension builds steadily as the various threats converge, leading to a climactic confrontation.
A smart, suspenseful novel that masterfully intertwines medicine, mystery, and morality.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9798888246177
Page Count: 344
Publisher: Koehler Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 14, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.
Dead bodies turn up in the first sentence of the prologue in McFadden’s latest domestic thriller.
The mystery of who died is at the pulsating heart of this propulsive tale. As Chapter 1 begins, Naomi arrives home to find the locks changed on the front door of the gorgeous home she shares with her husband, Jeremy, and their 5-year-old son, Teddy. Jeremy steps out the front door and convinces Naomi to move out while he has their home renovated, a plan Naomi knows nothing about. It’s all a ruse, though, as the next day Jeremy tells her he wants a divorce. Naomi is shellshocked and soon discovers that Jeremy is having an affair with Veronica, a beautiful younger woman. What seems at first like a stereotypical story about a man who leaves his wife turns into something else when Naomi decides she’ll do anything to get Veronica away from Jeremy and Teddy, and Veronica decides to fight for what she thinks she deserves. Fans of stalker novels will cringe with delight as creepy things start to happen. Teddy’s stuffed elephant, a gift from Veronica, is found impaled on a kitchen knife; Naomi suspects Jeremy is gaslighting her and that Veronica tried to poison her. A weird confrontation among Jeremy, Veronica, and Naomi at Teddy’s birthday party, to which Naomi shows up uninvited, is priceless. There are three main characters, and any or all of them may be unreliable narrators. Packing the plot with dark, gasp-inducing twists, McFadden outdoes herself in a story about how highly emotional people engage in risky behavior to get what they want—but in this novel, for better or worse, not everyone will survive.
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249631
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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