A raucously funny yet heartfelt and illuminating tale of holy orders at their most chaotic.
Rogue nuns and a psychic novice reinvigorate a failing convent in this comic novel.
Hartley’s rollicking yarn centers on Our Lady of the Highway, a run-down convent in a grim, industrial area of Brooklyn where the sisters have spent 347 years praying nonstop in shifts for world peace. But with only three nuns left, the youngest being the 71-year-old Mother Superior, Sister Bernadette, their vigil will sputter out unless the parish priest can find new blood. Such materializes in the form of Sister Magdalena, who’s a fugitive thanks to righteous crimes, such as sinking a freighter full of weapons bound for a Venezuelan coup. She brings along Sisters Evelyn and Veronica, both with equally shady resumes. Taking over as Mother Superior, Magdalena scandalizes Bernadette by starting a microbrewery to cater to Brooklyn hipsters. Meanwhile, the sisters fend off the machinations of a tycoon who wants to turn the convent into a sewage treatment plant. Further stirring the pot is Lola, a former insurance claims adjuster with psycho-kinetic powers that result in stopped clocks, shattered glass, or collapsing fire escapes when she gets upset. She joins the convent thinking it’s a calm place where she can’t hurt anyone. With a marketing plan of offering intercessory prayers for customers who buy beer and having Lola do pin-up posters in an off-the-shoulder habit, the convent does a boffo business and signs up dozens of new nuns—until the police, the FBI, and the National Guard come for Magdalena. Hartley, a celebrated indie film director, writes in a confidently cinematic style, filling the novel with quirky, sharply drawn characters; multiple viewpoints and flashbacks; exquisitely carved, imagistic vignettes—“Confident, preoccupied, serious but smiling, Magdalena is uncomplicated, graceful and selfless even as she pauses to slip a handgun into her ankle boot”—and hilarious deadpan dialogue. (“Mother Superior, may I ask a question?” “Of course.” “Are you all wanted by the law?”) For all its farcical elements, the story is an inquisitive depiction of the cloistered life, exploring its seething tensions and energetic discipline and taking seriously its commitments. (“In reality,” Bernadette muses, “God doesn’t make himself known to you except through the miracles of endurance and selflessness.”) The result is an entertaining but thoughtful spoof.
A raucously funny yet heartfelt and illuminating tale of holy orders at their most chaotic.Pub Date: June 14, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-73792-743-3
Page Count: 316
Publisher: Elboro Press
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.
A love story about a life of second chances.
In Nassau, in the Bahamas, casino detective Vincent LaPorta grills Alfie Logan, who’d come up a winner three times in a row at the roulette table and walked away with $2 million. “How did you do it?” asks the detective. Alfie calmly denies cheating. You wired all the money to a Gianna Rule, LaPorta says. Why? To explain, Alfie produces a composition book with the words “For the Boss, to Be Read Upon My Death” written on the cover. Read this for answers, Alfie suggests, calling it a love story. His mother had passed along to him a strange trait: He can say “Twice!” and go back to a specific time and place to have a do-over. But it only works once for any particular moment, and then he must live with the new consequences. He can only do this for himself and can’t prevent anyone from dying. Alfie regularly uses his power—failing to impress a girl the first time, he finds out more about her, goes back in time, and presto! She likes him. The premise is of course not credible—LaPorta doesn’t buy it either—but it’s intriguing. Most people would probably love to go back and unsay something. The story’s focus is on Alfie’s love for Gianna and whether it’s requited, unrequited, or both. In any case, he’s obsessed with her. He’s a good man, though, an intelligent person with ordinary human failings and a solid moral compass. Albom writes in a warm, easy style that transports the reader to a world of second chances and what-ifs, where spirituality lies close to the surface but never intrudes on the story. Though a cynic will call it sappy, anyone who is sick to their core from the daily news will enjoy this escape from reality.
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780062406682
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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