An often engaging novel with surprising characters.
A police officer’s investigation into a string of murders uncovers a terrorist conspiracy in this political thriller.
Higgins structures his novel as an inevitable confrontation between Malachi Wolf, a Washington, D.C., police officerinvestigating a series of deaths,and Austin,an ex-soldier–turned–revenge killer after his lover’s murder by an Afghan National Army soldier in Afghanistan. Austin and Malachi come off as offbeat characters thanks to the author’s attention to their backstories and relationships: Austin dotes on his rescue dog, Sophie, and Malachi left graduate school for law enforcement after his father died in the Boston Marathon bombing; the latter then developed multiple sclerosis. Higgins amplifies the connection between Malachi and Austin—specifically, their reactions to the murders of loved ones by extremist violence—by developing secondary characters’ histories. For example, Malachi’s older partner, Detective Thomas Jones, “seemed to want Malachi to carry on his legacy,” and Dr. Zahra Mansour, an expert in Middle East studies and Malachi’s lover, discusses her past as a student in Egypt within the context of fundamental Islamic politics. Zahra also introduces Malachi to the Brotherhood, an Islamic extremist group that finances attempts “to infiltrate and subvert Western civilization” by influencing “curriculum in elementary and high schools…subvert[ing] large swaths of the media.” Higgins’ tactic of pitting Malachi against multiple adversaries adds to the novel’s sense of urgency, as does his vivid, harsh prose; Malachi’s “conversion from civilian to cop…had happened overnight, like having an epiphany…or a stroke.” Sometimes, though, the author’s passionate dialogue can be somewhat unwieldy: “It’s a calling, an internal need to fight evil, an impulse to protect.”
An often engaging novel with surprising characters.Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-68433-869-6
Page Count: 378
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
Review Posted Online: Aug. 10, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.
Childhood friends, almost-sweethearts, a misunderstanding, and a funeral.
Blair Lang and Declan Renshaw were best friends who went on one date before a disagreement and an accident sent them in different directions after high school. Now Blair is back from college to be with her great-aunt Lottie, who’s dying, and to support her single mother in small-town Seabrook, California. Finding a job at a coffee shop puts her in the path of her former boyfriend, since he turns out to be its owner. Can the two get past their mistakes? The novel uses the popular second-chance romance trope, but Pham fails to energize it through interesting characters. Blair’s grief over her great-aunt’s death and her plan to help her mother are overshadowed by internal monologues about her feelings, the way her friends aren’t paying attention to her, and the novel she plans to write. Declan’s distinguishing characteristic, besides being a former high school quarterback, is his skill at building birdhouses. Unsurprisingly, the couple doesn’t have much chemistry; when they embrace, their “bodies meld like…memory foam.” The wooden characters, unusual word choices (“conglomerate of pedestrians,” “litany of plants”), and odd turns of phrase (“tension melting from his eyebrows like butter melting in a warm pan”) are almost enough to obscure the lack of plot development. What passes for stakes is easily defused when Blair comes into an inheritance that saves her from working as a consultant at Ernst & Young in New York—so she can write a romance novel.
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781668095188
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: yesterday
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.
A frustrated advice columnist takes matters into her own hands.
Before dropping out of MIT during the second semester of her sophomore year, Debbie Mullen had designs on becoming the next Bill Gates. Now, almost 30 years later, the stay-at-home wife and mother of two uses her considerable genius to keep the Mullens’ Hingham, Massachusetts, household functioning “like a well-oiled machine.” In her spare time, Debbie also gardens and shares “the fruits of [her] wisdom” with neighbors via the weekly advice column she writes for Hingham Household, a local “family-oriented” newspaper. Though Debbie is proud of her husband and teen daughters’ accomplishments, her own life sometimes feels a bit empty. As such, she’s both honored and excited when Home Gardening magazine selects her backyard to feature in their next issue. Then, at the last minute, the publication decides to go in a different direction and instead spotlights the roses of her arch rival. Later that day, the editor-in-chief of Hingham Household axes her column because she’d counseled a reader to get a divorce. That evening, Debbie learns that her hard-working husband’s miserly boss refused his promotion request, her brilliant older daughter’s sketchy boyfriend broke her heart, and her athletically gifted younger daughter’s chauvinistic coach cut her from the soccer team for being “chubby.” Enough is enough. Debbie has always given great advice—everybody says so. If certain individuals don’t know what’s best for themselves, maybe it’s her obligation to help them see the light. Increasingly unhinged entries from a “Dear Debbie” drafts folder pepper the briskly paced, meticulously crafted tale, which unfolds courtesy of a pinwheeling first-person narrative. Some of the plot’s myriad twists are more impressive than others, but plucky, puckish Debbie is a nontraditional antihero for the ages.
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249624
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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