by Janice Coy ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 15, 2015
A seaside mystery with an appealing heroine, but one that needs more red herrings.
In Coy’s (A Table on Kilimanjaro, 2013, etc.) mystery novel, dead seals start washing up on the local beach soon after a young woman’s friend disappears.
Jaye Walker, 25, is on her second summer of managing a kayak and surf shop in Agave Beach, California, saving money for her next adventure. Due in part to a childhood experience of abandonment, Jaye’s philosophy is to keep moving and live her life without attachments. But that gets complicated after Gerald, an older homeless man who helped out at the shop, disappears, leaving Baby, his Chihuahua mix, behind. Jaye decides to look after the dog temporarily, but Josue Segura, an attractive 30-ish photographer who’s new in town, is also claiming her attention. The two hit it off—he teaches Jaye how to scuba dive, which she loves—but she wonders if he’s really just a photographer. Jaye then sees her dream of traveling recede further when she must use her own money to pay surf-shop wages after a burglary. Meanwhile, the town is troubled by dozens of dead seals and sea lions washing up in the cove; they appear shark-bitten and leave a terrible smell, which alarms visitors. Then Jaye is attacked by a strange man on the beach. With several mysteries swirling around her, Jaye must decide her next move. Coy uses her beachside setting well, contrasting Agave Beach’s innocent sand castles and clueless tourists with the mysterious ocean—so foreign with its dark depths, sharks, kelp forests, and sea caves. Jaye’s independence, hard work, and wit make her admirable. She and the other characters are well-drawn, with interesting back stories, although some points are repeated too often, such as Jaye’s commitment issues. But with only a handful of characters, Coy doesn’t offer enough suspects to make this a compelling mystery. The book is instead filled out with, for example, the minutiae of scuba diving. These details are well-described but unnecessary to advance the mystery plot.
A seaside mystery with an appealing heroine, but one that needs more red herrings.Pub Date: Aug. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5147-8278-1
Page Count: 290
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Christina Lauren ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 10, 2018
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.
Eleven years ago, he broke her heart. But he doesn’t know why she never forgave him.
Toggling between past and present, two love stories unfold simultaneously. In the first, Macy Sorensen meets and falls in love with the boy next door, Elliot Petropoulos, in the closet of her dad’s vacation home, where they hide out to discuss their favorite books. In the second, Macy is working as a doctor and engaged to a single father, and she hasn’t spoken to Elliot since their breakup. But a chance encounter forces her to confront the truth: what happened to make Macy stop speaking to Elliot? Ultimately, they’re separated not by time or physical remoteness but by emotional distance—Elliot and Macy always kept their relationship casual because they went to different schools. And as a teen, Macy has more to worry about than which girl Elliot is taking to the prom. After losing her mother at a young age, Macy is navigating her teenage years without a female role model, relying on the time-stamped notes her mother left in her father’s care for guidance. In the present day, Macy’s father is dead as well. She throws herself into her work and rarely comes up for air, not even to plan her upcoming wedding. Since Macy is still living with her fiance while grappling with her feelings for Elliot, the flashbacks offer steamy moments, tender revelations, and sweetly awkward confessions while Macy makes peace with her past and decides her future.
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2801-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
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by Christina Lauren ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 14, 2019
Heartfelt and funny, this enemies-to-lovers romance shows that the best things in life are all-inclusive and nontransferable...
An unlucky woman finally gets lucky in love on an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii.
From getting her hand stuck in a claw machine at age 6 to losing her job, Olive Torres has never felt that luck was on her side. But her fortune changes when she scores a free vacation after her identical twin sister and new brother-in-law get food poisoning at their wedding buffet and are too sick to go on their honeymoon. The only catch is that she’ll have to share the honeymoon suite with her least favorite person—Ethan Thomas, the brother of the groom. To make matters worse, Olive’s new boss and Ethan’s ex-girlfriend show up in Hawaii, forcing them both to pretend to be newlyweds so they don’t blow their cover, as their all-inclusive vacation package is nontransferable and in her sister’s name. Plus, Ethan really wants to save face in front of his ex. The story is told almost exclusively from Olive’s point of view, filtering all communication through her cynical lens until Ethan can win her over (and finally have his say in the epilogue). To get to the happily-ever-after, Ethan doesn’t have to prove to Olive that he can be a better man, only that he was never the jerk she thought he was—for instance, when she thought he was judging her for eating cheese curds, maybe he was actually thinking of asking her out. Blending witty banter with healthy adult communication, the fake newlyweds have real chemistry as they talk it out over snorkeling trips, couples massages, and a few too many tropical drinks to get to the truth—that they’re crazy about each other.
Heartfelt and funny, this enemies-to-lovers romance shows that the best things in life are all-inclusive and nontransferable as well as free.Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2803-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
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