Kudos to Hurwitz for creating this series. Let’s hope the Nowhere Man’s phone rings again.
This fifth in the Orphan X series (Out of the Dark, 2019, etc.) features one deadly crisis after another for a killer who’d really just like to retire and become human.
In a spectacular opening scene, a man who has supposedly rescued rich businessman Grant Merriweather from a car crash and brought him to an urgent-care facility pulls out a gun and murders him along with the doctors who helped him regain consciousness. Now the bad guys are after Merriweather's downtrodden cousin Max, whom most of his family doesn’t like and “no one would miss.” Meanwhile, Evan Smoak is Orphan X, or the Nowhere Man. He was raised and trained as a killer for a secret government program but has been entirely on his own for years. A desperate person who calls his secret number, 1-855-2-NOWHERE, will hear him say, Do you need my help?” Then, if he so chooses, he will take any risk to help that stranger. Evan receives technical help from smart-mouthed 16-year-old genius geek Joey, who can hack into anything and even control surveillance cameras. The plot unfolds in the same pattern as the first four in the series: Evan slays bad guys with uncanny skill, but, like a bloody game of whack-a-mole, the threats keep popping up. What makes this mission different is that he wants it to be his last. The government has been trying to eliminate him—lots of backstory there—and now retirement is beckoning. If only he could sit in his elaborate condo and sip CLIX vodka while he heals from his numerous concussions. Evan is devoid of social skills, and it’s fun to watch him dodge small talk with his homeowners association. Other men had once chosen his life and molded him into a killer. Now he’d like “a life of his own making,” but “without the Nowhere Man, who the hell was Evan Smoak?” Give him a day with his boring neighbors and he’ll un-retire in a hurry.
Kudos to Hurwitz for creating this series. Let’s hope the Nowhere Man’s phone rings again.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-12045-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Minotaur
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2019
The worst fear raised by this odd creature feature is that it will spawn a sequel.
When he and his widowed mother are threatened by a freakish killer, a brilliant 11-year-old boy on the autism spectrum teams with an orphaned dog with human intelligence to fight off evil.
The boy, Woody, hasn't spoken a word in his life but has created a sophisticated virtual world to escape to and can hack the most complex dark web networks. He's determined to avenge his researcher father, who died in a suspicious helicopter crash. The dog, Kipp, orphaned by the death of his aged, loving caretaker, is part of an underground canine network boasting many other similarly advanced, genetically engineered dogs. (These dogs, who call themselves the Mysterium, are capable of such miracles as retrieving books from the library and reading them at night.) Out of the blue, a man who once worked with Woody's father and briefly dated Megan, Woody's mother, propositions and then threatens her. "I am becoming the king of beasts," he boasts, after having bitten a young woman to death. There is certainly no lack of raw action in the book, Koontz's first following five novels featuring investigator Jane Hawk. It just takes a certain kind of reader to...swallow the plot. Depending on one's susceptibility to heart-tugging boy-and-dog tales, the novel will either be dismissed as a work of cloying commercial calculation or enjoyed as a crafty blend of genres.
The worst fear raised by this odd creature feature is that it will spawn a sequel.Pub Date: April 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1542019507
Page Count: 380
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
As with all of Greaney’s work, this is a fun read. If only all our wars were fiction.
Russia launches war in Europe and Africa in this military thriller reminiscent of the late Tom Clancy.
A small group of Chinese communist special forces sneaks into Taiwan to assassinate a politician and provoke a war. This attracts intense U.S. attention—perfect timing for Russia to launch Operation Red Metal and “retain its proper place in the world.” The Russians' ultimate goal is to keep control of a rare-earth mine in Kenya, for which they need to wield “a scalpel through the heart of Europe” to destroy AFRICOM, the U.S. Africa Command headquartered in Germany. They kill Western satellites to take out GPS and make Europe deaf, mute, and blind. On Christmas Day, Russian trains disguised as civilian transport deliver offensive forces into Europe, unloading troops and tanks. They also attack in Kenya, where battles rage. NATO hasn’t detected this military buildup and is taken completely by surprise. A Russian general opines that the U.S. can’t fight a conventional force anymore, embroiled as it’s been in Afghanistan. Ha! Tell it to the Marines, like Lt. Col. Dan Connolly, who knows “this world’s a damn dangerous place” and figures out what the enemy is up to. The war lasts about a week, plenty of time for intense battle scenes and the distinct possibility of tactical nukes. Having produced well over 600 pages, Greaney and Rawlings, his Marine co-author, had a bout of logorrhea, but the collaboration has yielded plenty of realism. There are some good lines, as when an A-10 pilot strafes the ground while screaming “Die, Commie, die!” (He apparently didn’t get the memo about the USSR.) But the best line: “And as long as we get to pop a bunch of those Russkies, death ain’t but a thing.” Readers will be humming "The Marines’ Hymn” after finishing this paean to the U.S. Marines. Hoorah!
As with all of Greaney’s work, this is a fun read. If only all our wars were fiction.Pub Date: July 16, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-451-49041-4
Page Count: 656
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: April 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2019
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