An above-par thriller hitting the sweet spot between sympathy and repulsion for a probable killer.
On the back nine of her 60s, a beautiful, canny woman remains a pro at snagging rich old duffers, then leaving them in the rough, and possibly in the ground.
In Marshall’s (Little Miss Sure Shot, 2014, etc.) first thriller, septuagenarian Dean and sexagenarian Suzy Perry married recently, shortly after the death of the bride’s previous spouse. On the surface, Suzy seems the ideal country club wife for moneyed Dean, whose house overlooks a golf course. But the slim, bridge-playing, Mercedes-driving blonde may have skeletons as well as Prada in her Westchester County closet. She talks little about her previous life in Atlanta with her former husband, who died of a heart attack that surprised everyone, including a cardiologist. Some sleuthing on the part of Dean’s son, Alex, reveals that Suzy may have had yet another husband who unexpectedly died decades earlier from heart failure in suburban St. Louis. If true, Suzy had a different name back then—Bettina—and a child who seems to have vanished. Or was it Bettina who vanished, morphing into a psychopath with no past and multiple murders on her score card? Her disturbing backstory includes abuse, betrayal, and an injury that resulted in a permanent limp “that sullied an image of otherwise near-perfection, like a blotch on the front of a snow-white dress.” Lively conversation and playful descriptions such as a dog’s “wagging his curved tail like a metronome” fill the pages. Points awarded for a thriller with a median character age that appears to be bumping 60. The book starts strongly, with Suzy on the run and the past events revealed at a good pace. Midbook the introduction of a blackmailer works well, but a disturbing medical issue has no follow-up. Ultimately, like Suzy herself, the story ends up limping a bit, though the final few pages may tempt a reader to a smile and wonder if a sequel could be crafted.
An above-par thriller hitting the sweet spot between sympathy and repulsion for a probable killer.Pub Date: Aug. 6, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4575-7045-2
Page Count: 232
Publisher: Dog Ear Publishing
Review Posted Online: Jan. 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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
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