Barnes’ novel will be of particular interest to those familiar with slots, blackjack and the seamy side of casinos.
A Vegas novel, so naturally, it concerns scamming the casinos.
Jude Helms is out of his element in Las Vegas, for he’s that seeming rarity: an honest dealer. But he’s run into a string of bad luck, having been fired without cause from several casinos. (Well, perhaps not totally without cause. Once, he complimented a customer for her largesse, which was misconstrued as “large ass.") Now, it’s 20 years later, and although his marriage has fallen apart, he’s close to his children, 14-year-old Beth and recent college graduate Lucas. All Jude really wants is enough money to start his own masonry company, but until that time, he’s committed—or condemned—to work the tables. Finally he seems to get a break when Audie, the mother of one of Beth’s friends, introduces him to Ben, who’s impressed by Jude’s skill in dealing cards. Ben works with him and with Angel, a slick con, to perfect Jude’s technique in checking and changing cards without being seen. In a hierarchy of corruption, Ben seems to be working for the mysterious Wade, an ex-con definitely not to be messed with. When Jude feels he’s had enough, Ben informs him that he’s now “in” and can’t escape the $2 million scam that’s planned involving a “cold deck,” in which a deck of cards with predictable patterns is substituted for one of the casino decks in the shoe. Jude does everything he can to extricate himself from his morally compromising situation and to protect his children, something made far more difficult when he discovers that Audie, with whom he’s developed a sexual relationship, is perhaps the mastermind behind the whole scheme—and is also married to the ever-menacing Wade.
Barnes’ novel will be of particular interest to those familiar with slots, blackjack and the seamy side of casinos.Pub Date: March 15, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-87417-884-5
Page Count: 216
Publisher: Univ. of Nevada
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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