An intense and despairing portrait of an ordinary, dysfunctional family harboring deep-seated resentments.
An ailing, embittered man finds himself dependent on his long-suffering wife in Gilbert’s family drama.
Facing imminent death, Richard Collins invites his three adult sons—Seth, Dexter (“Deck”), and Nick—to join him and their mother at their southern Illinois lake house. It’s anything but a cozy family reunion, as Richard plans to reveal the shocking details of his will—he seems to be anticipating the devastating impact with almost spiteful satisfaction. Richard, an overbearing retired lawyer, snaps at Grace as she tends to his meals, refills his whiskey, and physically assists him; the division of his wealth will be the patriarch’s last chance to really throw his weight around. While tension between the couple is palpable, it’s Richard’s final wishes that force Grace to re-evaluate their life together. On the surface, Grace is a dithering, doting wife, but secretly she questions whether she ever truly loved Richard: Was his unkindness and harsh judgment of their children emotional abuse? Nick, a professional cellist who keeps his boyfriend private, constantly disappoints his father; commitment-phobe Deck has arrived with yet another new woman in tow; and Seth, the adopted misfit, has found a sense of belonging in religion and with his wife, but he earns little selling roadside flowers. As the family gathers, festering issues surface, evoking a feeling of intense claustrophobia. Through carefully crafted interiority and multiple points of view, Gilbert captures the complexities of damaged relationships in a way that feels unnerving and real. (Reflecting on marriage, Richard bleakly considers the “androgyny of two sexless bodies bound together in greying frailty.”) The story’s pacing lags due to excessive backstory and repetition; however, the lake-house scenes are so intimate and immersive it’s like being a fly on the wall witnessing a family in crisis. Although some wounds are never completely mended, there is healing, and each of the characters undergoes varying degrees of transformation.
An intense and despairing portrait of an ordinary, dysfunctional family harboring deep-seated resentments.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9798891324473
Page Count: 194
Publisher: Atmosphere Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 8, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
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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