A dizzyingly enjoyable spy plot that offers consistent suspense.
In Mahler’s (Money, 2011, etc.) latest thriller, secret agent Betty Thursten ends up in the cross hairs of her black-ops employer, who thinks that she’s gone rogue.
Betty works for Control, which is targeting a global empire called the World Order Cabal—a group that’s most likely behind her fiance José’s murder. Her latest mission leaves her injured and her partner, Gil, captured. As Betty spends her ensuing downtime at her apartment, things take an unexpected turn. After she glimpses a friend’s private message, she begins to question not only her own parentage, but her part in Control. Meanwhile, her former lover and current boss, Tom Howell, has his own doubts about the agency founded by his father, which isn’t above committing atrocious deeds to keep its secrets. His affection for Betty clashes with his father’s demand that she be added to a termination list. This densely plotted novel picks up right where the previous one left off, with Betty and Gil in midassignment. Readers need not have read the previous book, although it does enhance the story. An operative named Babs, for example, has a minor but significant role here, but the details of her curious association with Tom were revealed in the preceding novel. There’s a lot more action this time around, though, particularly after Betty realizes that the World Order Cabal is keeping Gil prisoner and decides to rescue him. The plot also has more intrigue, as more than one character learns new information about his or her bloodlines. The numerous connections between characters can be confusing, but occasional recaps help; a bewildered Betty even begins one with the phrase, “Let me get this straight.” Still, the author wisely opts for a more linear tale in this installment, tying off lingering storylines, including one about a pesky mole in Control, while leaving a few subplots open for another sequel.
A dizzyingly enjoyable spy plot that offers consistent suspense.Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-9882628-1-2
Page Count: 304
Publisher: White Bradford Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 25, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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