In this sequel, a United States attorney and a task force pursue a murderous cartel leader in South America.
In his past dealings with the Baja Norte Familia, San Diego prosecutor Nick Drummond shot and killed the drug cartel’s lieutenant. But the deputy district attorney, believing Nick shot an unarmed man, brings a first-degree murder indictment against him. Nick is already assisting the U.S. Marshal’s office in linking cartel leader Javier Esquel-Ranchez to the murder of a deputy marshal. As Javier ties up “loose ends” related to the homicide, he also seeks vengeance, which includes putting a hit on Nick for the fatal shooting. In the meantime, Javier heads south, initially to Peru, to establish a way to transport cocaine to the United States. Nick and a task force are intent on capturing the cartel leader so he can face charges in America. They’ll have to track and ultimately confront Javier and his men in the Amazon jungle. But succeeding at trial may necessitate securing a witness: Raul Saladez-Montes, one of the hired guns in the deputy marshal’s homicide, who, after surviving the cartel’s assassination attempt, is on the hunt for Javier. As Dutton’s second installment is directly connected to the preceding novel, Path to Justice (2017), the book hits the ground running. All of the subplots and alternating narrative perspectives, particularly Nick’s and Javier’s, generate a brisk, steady pace. Action takes precedence over the legal battles, and readers unfortunately see very little of Nick inside a courtroom. Nevertheless, the story delivers surprisingly effective melodrama, like Nick, separated from his wife, becoming romantically involved with Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Ana Schwartz. Similarly, there are tender moments featuring Javier and Elin Staarsgard, a zoology professor on sabbatical. This relationship makes Javier somewhat sympathetic, even though readers know without a doubt that he’s a malicious criminal.
A rousing, energetic drug tale sure to spark interest in this legal thriller series.Pub Date: Dec. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-951559-01-4
Page Count: 312
Publisher: Lettra Press LLC
Review Posted Online: March 25, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Categories: CRIME & LEGAL THRILLER | THRILLER
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A bloody and grotesque but ultimately entertaining and inspiring take on horror movies, trauma, and self-determination.
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Serial killer survivors are forced to cooperate when they’re dragged screaming back into jeopardy.
You have to give it to Hendrix, author of The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires (2020), for tapping into his deep knowledge of horror films and fiction to find a new angle on the tropes of terror with every outing. In the same way Edgar Cantero lampooned Scooby Doo in Meddling Kids (2017), this scary unraveling aims straight for the sheer terrors the best slasher films create. Here, Hendrix has zeroed in on the so-called “final girl,” the sole survivor of a horrific massacre—you’re already thinking of Jamie Lee Curtis in the Halloween movies or Sigourney Weaver in Alien. This book is even more skin-crawling, as deeply paranoid Lynnette Tarkington (impaled on an antler trophy during her first unfortunate encounter years ago) reluctantly participates in group therapy sessions with Dr. Carol Elliot along with fellow survivors Marilyn Torres, who has buried her emotions in wealth; Dani Shipman, who might have killed the wrong person; Julia Campbell, whose encounter left her in a wheelchair; and Heather DeLuca, who is succumbing to addiction. Hendrix can be tongue-in-cheek (see Horrorstör, 2014) but is deadly serious here while still warping the conventions of the genre, including the fact that some of the survivors have participated in graphic horror flicks depicting their very real traumas. The book is creepy enough on its face, but Hendrix’s use of expedient narrative tools, including a laconic cowboy lawman, an overly eager journalist, and a host of archetypal serial killers, heightens the unease. After one member of this vigilant sisterhood is murdered and a series of oddly prescient attacks threaten the rest, Lynnette becomes increasingly suspicious that the attacks are originating way too close to their inner circle. “Does this ever end?” Lynnette asks. “Will there always be someone out there turning little boys into monsters? Will we always be final girls? Will there always be monsters killing us? How do we stop the snake from eating its own tail?”
A bloody and grotesque but ultimately entertaining and inspiring take on horror movies, trauma, and self-determination.Pub Date: July 13, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-20123-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 5, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
Categories: SUSPENSE | THRILLER | SUSPENSE | PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE
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BOOK TO SCREEN
A blend of psychological mystery and gothic thriller puts a psychotherapist in pursuit of a serial killer on the campus of Cambridge University.
The author’s second novel features a psychotherapist as its main character, as did his 2019 debut, The Silent Patient (whose main character makes an appearance here). This book’s protagonist is Mariana, who has a busy practice in London specializing in group therapy. At 36, she’s a widow, reeling from the drowning a year before of her beloved husband, Sebastian. She’s galvanized out of her fog by a call from her niece, Zoe, who was raised by Mariana and Sebastian after her parents died. Zoe is now studying at Cambridge, where Mariana and Sebastian met and courted. Zoe has terrible news: Her close friend Tara has been murdered, savagely stabbed and dumped in a wood. Mariana heads for Cambridge and, when the police arrest someone she thinks is innocent, starts her own investigation. She zeroes in on Edward Fosca, a handsome, charismatic classics professor who has a cultlike following of beautiful female students (which included Tara) called the Maidens, a reference to the cult of Eleusis in ancient Greece, whose followers worshipped Demeter and Persephone. Suspicious characters seem to be around every ivy-covered corner of the campus, though—an audacious young man Mariana meets on the train, one of her patients who has turned stalker, a porter at one of the college’s venerable houses, even the surly police inspector. The book gets off to a slow start, front-loaded with backstories and a Cambridge travelogue, but then picks up the pace and piles up the bodies. With its ambience of ritualistic murders, ancient myths, and the venerable college, the story is a gothic thriller despite its contemporary setting. That makes Mariana tough to get on board with—she behaves less like a modern professional woman than a 19th-century gothic heroine, a clueless woman who can be counted on in any situation to make the worst possible choice. And the book’s ending, while surprising, also feels unearned, like a bolt from the blue hurled by some demigod.
Eerie atmosphere isn’t enough to overcome an unsatisfying plot and sometimes-exasperating protagonist.Pub Date: June 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-30445-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
Categories: SUSPENSE | PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER | SUSPENSE | THRILLER | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE | GENERAL FICTION
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