When a woman falls under the thrall of an unscrupulous therapist, she must reconcile with the demons of her past in order to confront the present.
Beth is drifting through life with some appearance of ease, a successful London artist with a precocious preteen daughter and a charmingly attentive and supportive husband. In fact, it’s Sol’s suggestion that she seek out therapy as Fern’s 13th birthday approaches; Beth was abandoned by her own mother when she was 13, and he wants to help her navigate the inevitably painful memories that will arise. So Beth begins to meet with Dr. Tamara Bywater, but as therapy continues, she begins to feel more and more estranged from her daughter. Sol and Tamara both try to soothe her, reminding her that it's natural teen behavior to pull away and acknowledging Beth’s own baggage when it comes to mothering, but soon, Beth and Fern are barely speaking. When Tamara begins to make friendly overtures, Beth is flattered and desperate to keep her attention. Slowly, she finds herself deeply fascinated by Tamara, open to a flirtation that will threaten everything she holds dear. Briscoe slowly and skillfully unspools the sexual and psychological tension to the breaking point; even as it becomes apparent to the reader that Tamara Bywater is disturbed and manipulative, we can't help but understand, for a time, Beth’s clinging to the adventure and romance she offers. Buried at the heart of Beth’s choices are her own fears that she is, in fact, unlovable, as proven by her mother’s constant rejection. Like the smooth surface of an oil painting, the novel presents a slickly beautiful vision of fantasy, layered under with ferocious, stabbing brushstrokes of pain.
A haunting novel that lays bare the ugliness of narcissism at its most extreme.Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-40887-349-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: June 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2020
Categories: CRIME & LEGAL THRILLER | SUSPENSE | SUSPENSE | THRILLER | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE | GENERAL FICTION
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BOOK REVIEW
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z (2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 10, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A small-town Mississippi courtroom becomes the setting for a trademark Grisham legal tussle.
Stuart Kofer is not a nice guy. He drinks way too much and likes to brawl. One night, coming home in a foul mood with a blood alcohol count more than triple the legal limit, he breaks his live-in girlfriend’s jaw. He’s done terrible things to her children, too—and now her 16-year-old boy, Drew, puts an end to the terror. Unfortunately for the kid in a place where uniforms are worshipped, Stu was a well-liked cop. “Did it really matter if he was sixteen or sixty? It certainly didn’t matter to Stu Kofer, whose stock seemed to rise by the hour,” writes Grisham of local opinion about giving Drew the benefit of the doubt. Jake Brigance, the hero of the tale, is a lawyer who’s down to his last dime until a fat wrongful-death case is settled. It doesn’t help his bank book when the meaningfully named Judge Omar Noose orders him to defend the kid. Backed by a brilliant paralegal whose dream is to be the first Black female lawyer in the county, he prepares for what the local sheriff correctly portends will be “an ugly trial” that may well land Drew on death row. As ever, Grisham capably covers the mores of his native turf, from gun racks to the casual use of the N-word. As well, he examines Bible Belt attitudes toward abortion and capital punishment as well as the inner workings of the courtroom, such as jury selection: “What will your jury look like?” asks a trial consultant, to which Jake replies, “A regular posse. It’s rural north Mississippi, and I’ll try to change venue to another county simply because of the notoriety.” The story runs on a touch long, as Grisham yarns tend to do, and it gets a bit gory at times, but the level of tension is satisfyingly high all the way to the oddly inconclusive end.
Grisham fans will be pleased, graphic details of evil behavior and all.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-385-54596-9
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2020
Categories: CRIME & LEGAL THRILLER | SUSPENSE | SUSPENSE | THRILLER | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE
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