A gripping, timely, and twisty thriller.
In Seaborne’s sixth series adventure, a pilot who can turn invisible and fly tackles a tangle of crimes, including serial killing and extortion.
It’s been a jam-packed year for Essex County Airport charter pilot Will Stewart since the midair collision that should have killed him. The crash left him with an amazing ability: he can float invisibly, no longer “subject to the laws of inertia and mass and gravity.” He’s called on this power, which he calls “the other thing,” to uncover truths and right wrongs committed by otherwise untouchable malefactors. While he’s invisible, Will can make other people float, too, which has allowed him to perform amazing rescues. Although he’s tried to keep his gift a secret, a small group, including his police detective wife, Andy, is in the know, and they’re concerned that online-retail billionaire Spiro Lewko has gotten his hands on the only surviving piece of debris from the mysterious object that collided with Will. Lewko intends to study the object at his highly secure, state-of-the-art research facility. Meanwhile, a vicious serial killer is murdering isolated farm families and threatens to keep doing so unless he receives $100 million from the Stewarts’ wealthy friend Sandy Stone. To raise the money, Stone must sell a valuable lakeside property that a National Football League star is currently renting. The athlete was recently arrested for providing alcohol to minors, so he’s broken the lease—a convenient situation for arrogant real estate developer Emilio DeSantorini, who wants to buy the property. Once again, Will must employ his special talents, join with allies, and investigate interrelated cases to ensure that justice is done.
Seaborne shows himself to be a reliably splendid storyteller in this latest outing. The plot is intricate and could have been confusing in lesser hands, but the author manages it well, keeping readers oriented amid unexpected developments. He captures a particular cultural zeitgeist by using bitcoin and the dark web as story elements, and he offers original characters that call to mind real-life figures, such as Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Donald Trump. His crisp writing about complex scenes and concepts is another strong suit, as when he describes Lewko’s laboratory, “a set director’s dream for a science fiction picture” where “sequential lights glowed in the floor, throbbing like weird luminescent water flowers sunk in an acrylic pond.” The fantasy of self-powered flight remains absolutely compelling, each installment bringing new revelations regarding its possibilities and origins. As a former charter pilot, Seaborne conveys Will’s delight not only in “the other thing,” but also in airplanes and the world of flight—an engaging subculture that he ably brings to life for the reader. Will is heroic and daring, as one would expect, but he’s also funny, compassionate, and affectionate. While embracing a troubled woman, for example, he reflects on his own feelings: “It wasn’t attraction, but it was love….The kind that hides beneath the skin of humanity and peeks out when tragedy reminds us that everyone around us reflects the face we see in the mirror.”
A gripping, timely, and twisty thriller.Pub Date: May 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-73368-345-6
Page Count: 414
Publisher: Trans World Data
Review Posted Online: June 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Maybe not the most thrilling thriller, but the role of AI in coping with grief gives this novel pathos and interest.
A widowed and disgraced plastic surgeon is drawn into a Russian oligarch’s evil schemes.
Witherspoon’s adult fiction debut, co-authored with thrillermeister Coben, opens as heart surgery performed by Dr. Marc Adams in a North African refugee camp is interrupted by the explosive invasion of armed militants. It's the last we will see of Marc in this dimension. The next chapter jumps ahead one year to a ceremony at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore where his widow, Maggie McCabe, is supposed to be presenting an award in honor of her mother. Miserable and anxious about appearing in public after having lost her medical license, she consults with her late husband on her phone—not via supernatural means, but using a "griefbot," an amazingly lifelike and functional AI app created by her genius sister, Sharon. Once the griefbot coaxes her to brave the sneering masses, she learns she’s been replaced on the podium anyway. But she runs into a former professor, a celebrity plastic surgeon, who requests a meeting with her at his office in New York and won’t take no for an answer. Next thing she knows, there’s $10 million in her bank account and she’s on a private plane heading to a palace outside Moscow where she’s been engaged to perform off-the-record surgery on billionaire Oleg Ragoravich (new face) and his girlfriend, Nadia (new boobs). And…we’re off. A whirl of surgeries, chases, and escapes ensues as Maggie gradually comes to understand who these people are and what they have in mind for her, and how it connects to Marc and their missing friend and business partner, Trace Packer. She is aided by her delightful father-in-law, Porkchop, owner of a biker bar in New York City and a very handy guy to have on your team if you've run afoul of an international criminal organization. From the palace in Rublevka the action moves to Dubai and then Bordeaux, climaxing in a high-stakes illegal heart transplant. But wait—is Marc really dead? What happened to Trace? Who is Nadia really? Though these smoldering questions don’t quite catch fire, it's a good first try for Witherspoon.
Maybe not the most thrilling thriller, but the role of AI in coping with grief gives this novel pathos and interest.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781538774700
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Fast-moving and disturbingly plausible.
Robots may be the future of warfare in this final father-son DeMille collaboration.
In Camp Hayden, Army Maj. Roger Ames is found dead, his skull crushed. Chief Warrant Officers Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor, special agents of the United States Army Criminal Investigation Division, are sent to the Mojave Desert, “a.k.a. in the middle of nowhere,” to investigate. In this fictional military installation, Army Rangers conduct field training exercises with lethal autonomous weapons. These “dangerous new toys,” nicknamed “tin men,” may become the future of warfare if they can be programmed to distinguish between friend and foe. Anyway, the Rangers’ job is to train the tin men, not the other way around. They are AI-driven robotic prototypes called D-17s, but even prototypes can kill. Did a bot kill the major? And was there criminal liability or intent, or was it a tragic accident? Brodie and Taylor discover that not everyone loves these beasts, and they must find out if humans are programming them for mischief or even trying to set up the program for failure. Meanwhile, the bots have nicknames. Bot number 20 is Bucky, seen on a video as a “seven-foot-tall titanium machine with hands covered in blood and brain matter” that has “a face but no eyes, with hands but no skin, with a body but no soul.” As scary as these beasties are, Brodie and Taylor must also look at the humans at Camp Hayden, because they learn that the “machines don’t have motives….They have inputs and outputs,” which naturally come from human programmers. They have neither brains nor courage nor honor; they do have brute force, speed, and agility. Obviously, plenty goes haywire in this enjoyable yarn. It feels a bit too believable for comfort, and that’s to the DeMilles’ credit as storytellers. Nelson DeMille had begun this project with his son Alex, who had to finish it alone after his father’s death.
Fast-moving and disturbingly plausible.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781501101878
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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