An intriguing but overly technical tale of frustrated love and ambition.
A tech entrepreneur struggles to launch his startup and hold together a tattered relationship with his girlfriend in this novel.
Stuart is a talented software engineer who develops a secure system, COMPASS, that helps clients safely connect to a “distributed cloud infrastructure.” This is an especially unconventional project since it is based on “open software,” the “rebel cult” to which he’s religiously devoted. His work takes him away from San Francisco and his girlfriend, Marie, with whom he suffers a hobbled relationship. He’s singularly obsessed with his career, and she’s equally attached to the prospect of having a child with him, though he seems completely disinterested in fatherhood, a divide sensitively limned by Townsend. Marie misses Stuart in his absence, and suddenly, without announcement, she flies to Seoul to see him, a visit he receives with ambivalent feelings. They move to Singapore together and travel all over Asia, but she’s unhappy—they’re not married, and she has neither a career nor a child to demand her devotion. But since Stuart fails to properly explain his product to prospective clients and at heart Marie is an author, he asks her to ghostwrite a book for him, a task that keeps her busy and at least nominally connected to his preoccupations. Townsend vividly depicts the singular cultural ethos of the tech world—that peculiar combination of microscopically diligent engineering and dreamy aspiration—and deftly dissects its global variations: Much of the tale takes place in Asia. But the tensions that beset Stuart and Marie, while delicately unfurled, are familiar, if not formulaic. In addition, the author draws readers deeply into the technical bowels of Stuart’s work with discussions that are terminologically prohibitive to the uninitiated and likely tedious. There are far too many lines like this one, which is spoken by Stuart: “They might have predictive analytics solutions, but the combination of the core COMPASS platform and the network data we’ve amassed through our MNS offering, together with the machine learning algorithms, will allow us to identify specific patterns and enable us to differentiate our services and emerge front and center in the growing cybersecurity space.”
An intriguing but overly technical tale of frustrated love and ambition.Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-68463-095-0
Page Count: 312
Publisher: SparkPress
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Escape to the lakefront with this entertaining romance.
A Canadian 30-something gets a second chance at love and career.
If Fern Brookbanks ever opened the Toronto espresso shop of her dreams, the first song on the playlist would be “Feeling Good” by Nina Simone. That could be the soundtrack of this upbeat, often very witty Canadian romance novel as well. Unfortunately, though, 32-year-old Fern will not be opening any espresso shops but instead must cope with managing the struggling cottage resort she's suddenly inherited on Lake Muskoka. She grew up on its grounds, and her only significant accomplishment so far in life is getting out of there. But then her mother, a 55-year-old powerhouse who's been running the place single-handedly all her adult life, dies in a car crash. Left to help poor Fern keep things going are her high school boyfriend, Jamie, and her mother's dear friend Peter, the resort's master baker, who helped raise Fern and nurtured her love of great playlists. Then Will Baxter, a handsome hunk her mother hired as a consultant to help save the hotel, turns out to be the very guy Fern had the most amazing night of her life with 10 years ago—only he broke her heart by failing to show up for their second date. Fortune fills her novel with food, music, and clothing descriptions and has some truly great one-liners: “I didn't know an apron could be sexy, but this apron is the lost Hemsworth brother of aprons.” The suspense is created by withholding information: What was Fern’s outrageous teenage transgression? What was the terrible thing she read in her mother’s diary? Why did Will stand her up 10 years ago? While this technique does feel a bit formulaic, it keeps the pages turning.
Escape to the lakefront with this entertaining romance.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9780593438558
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 7, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A compelling take on the classic whodunit.
The shocking murder of a public figure at a high-end hotel has everyone guessing who the culprit might be.
Twenty-five-year-old Molly Gray, an eccentric young woman who's obsessed with cleaning but doesn't quite have the same ability to navigate social cues as those around her, loves working as a maid at the Regency Grand Hotel. Raised by her old-fashioned grandmother, who loved nothing more than cleaning and watching Columbo reruns, Molly has an overly polite and straightforward manner that can make her seem odd and off-putting to her colleagues despite her being the hardest worker at the hotel. After her grandmother's death, Molly's rigid life begins to lose some of its long-held balance, and when the infamous Mr. Charles Black, a rich and powerful businessman suspected of various criminal enterprises, is found murdered in one of the rooms she cleans, her whole world gets turned upside down. Before Molly knows what's happening, her odd demeanor has the police convinced she's guilty of the crime, and certain people at the hotel are a little too pleased about it. With the help of a few new friends (and while fending off new foes), she must begin to untangle the mystery of who really killed Mr. Black to get herself off the hook once and for all. Though the unusual ending might frustrate some readers, this unique debut will keep them reading.
A compelling take on the classic whodunit.Pub Date: Jan. 4, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-35615-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 7, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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