Missing the nuance from Tony’s last adventure, but an exhilarating and complex story more than make up for it.
In Murphy’s (Tag Day, 2013) thriller, the CIA recruits a man with a unique talent, but an internal struggle for power within the agency may put him and his family in danger.
Computer Information Technologies employee Tony James’ ability to sense a person’s dominant personality trait piques the interest of the CIA’s Savant Syndrome Division. Almost immediately after the SSD drafts him, Tony receives a cryptic text: “REMEMBER, NOTHING IS REALLY AS IT SEEMS.” Sure enough, his very first mission, to gauge a potential SSD asset, goes awry when he narrowly escapes an explosion. Tony suspects his house is bugged and covertly checks out his handler, Audrey Shelton. It seems he’s caught in the midst of many potentially lethal secrets surrounding Audrey, starting back in 1995 when she succeeded her late hubby, Andrew, as CIT’s CEO. The novel, with chapters that alternate between present day and 1995, is a gleefully convoluted plot full of twists, suspense, and the occasional gunfight. The story thrives on its seemingly endless revelations: among the SSD agents, for example, is someone with a twin whose parents are a surprise Murphy saves for later in the novel. Tony’s sharing of the spotlight with Audrey does lessen his role in his own series, but Audrey is a worthy co-lead, both smart and resourceful. One of Tony’s most engrossing qualities is his Tourette’s syndrome, which played a significant role in the preceding book as he tried to hide his physical and verbal tics. This time around, unfortunately, his symptoms are no longer an obstacle and all but disappear. Murphy, however, loads his novel with intrigue, particularly in Tony’s ability to immediately glean someone’s nature.
Missing the nuance from Tony’s last adventure, but an exhilarating and complex story more than make up for it.Pub Date: July 18, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-9895076-4-6
Page Count: 524
Publisher: Five Star
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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