An action-packed and refreshingly innovative take on a popular genre.
In this theological thriller, a veteran police officer attempts to track down a peculiarly talented man suffering from amnesia who may be the key to the fate of the world.
Sgt. Alex Randall sees an “impossibly good looking” man meandering about aimlessly down a dead-end road. When he stops to check on his well-being, Randall discovers the man is suffering from radical amnesia. Not only does he not remember his own name, he seems to know virtually nothing about the world—he has to inquire what an ID is when asked to produce one. Randall decides to take him to Templeton Hall, a local psychiatric institute, where the stranger immediately charms the entire nursing staff—he’s so handsome, they name him Rex, Latin for king. Rex is visited at the hospital by an old man who warns him to flee—evil is fast approaching—and the next day, he’s disappeared and everyone at the facility, more than two dozen people, is found tortured and dead. Meanwhile, a man named Camael visits Randall and requests his help to find Rex—he’s willing to pay extravagant sums of money. He claims that Rex’s life is somehow wrapped up in the destiny of humanity, and despite the utter implausibility of his view, Randall is inclined to believe him and suspects he is an angel. Rex is preternaturally gifted at all things, and is recruited to become some kind of star—maybe a musician or a baseball player or actor—and is represented by Molly Simon, a photographer eager to capitalize on his infinite skills and marquee good looks. In his energetic novel, Carroll (The Horror Writer, 2017, etc.), a bestselling author and former journalist twice nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, artfully combines two genres—a hard-boiled detective mystery and a religion-infused tale about the end of the world. He blends the inventive with the stale, creating an unpredictable adventure within an all-too-familiar formula. But Randall’s character is a notable point of weakness—it’s hard to square his history as a policeman and soldier with his quick credulity. It’s remarkably early in the story when he confidently claims to Molly: “Make up your own mind…but to me it’s looking like a good versus evil thing.”
An action-packed and refreshingly innovative take on a popular genre.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9898269-6-9
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Swaggering Press
Review Posted Online: April 27, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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