He doubtless was hoping, like his characters, for a best-seller, and he’ll probably succeed on these shores as well with...
A missing girl, small-town secrets and literary ambition drive this busy, entertaining debut thriller, already a best-seller in Europe.
Young author Marcus Goldman hopes his mentor, the famous American novelist Harry Quebert, can help with the writer’s block afflicting his sophomore effort. Then their 2008 reunion in Somerset, N.H., is disrupted by the discovery of the remains of Nola Kellergan, who was Harry’s very underage 15-year-old girlfriend at the time she disappeared in 1975. Dicker moves deftly between the two periods, as Harry is jailed for Nola’s murder and Marcus seeks to exonerate him by delving into and writing about the old case. The 1975 narrative forms a book within the one covering 2008 events. Dicker throws in digressions on boxing, swipes at the publishing trade and Harry’s 31 writing rules. Add a cast almost as corny as that of the board game Clue: There’s the wealthy bachelor and his horribly disfigured chauffeur, the Southern preacher who blasts music to mask a terrible noise, the timid cop infatuated with the former prom queen who loves the famous writer who adores, alas, the jailbait beauty. Ah, Nola: She’s sexy, devoted and resourceful before she’s buried with a manuscript of Harry’s best novel right where the gardeners, 33 years later, want to plant hydrangeas in his yard. Dicker keeps the prose simple and the pace snappy in a plot that winds up with more twists than a Twizzler. He might have done without the chauffeur’s grotesque speech impediment and the sitcom chats Marcus has with his meddlesome mom. Nola’s precociousness strains plausibility, and a demon ex machina out of Alabama is one twist too many—or maybe it’s Dicker enjoying himself too much.
He doubtless was hoping, like his characters, for a best-seller, and he’ll probably succeed on these shores as well with this sprawling, likable whodunit, obvious ballast for the summer’s beach totes.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-14-312668-3
Page Count: 656
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: March 12, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
Dark and unsettling, this novel’s end arrives abruptly even as readers are still moving at a breakneck speed.
Ten years after her teenage daughter went missing, a mother begins a new relationship only to discover she can't truly move on until she answers lingering questions about the past.
Laurel Mack’s life stopped in many ways the day her 15-year-old daughter, Ellie, left the house to study at the library and never returned. She drifted away from her other two children, Hanna and Jake, and eventually she and her husband, Paul, divorced. Ten years later, Ellie’s remains and her backpack are found, though the police are unable to determine the reasons for her disappearance and death. After Ellie’s funeral, Laurel begins a relationship with Floyd, a man she meets in a cafe. She's disarmed by Floyd’s charm, but when she meets his young daughter, Poppy, Laurel is startled by her resemblance to Ellie. As the novel progresses, Laurel becomes increasingly determined to learn what happened to Ellie, especially after discovering an odd connection between Poppy’s mother and her daughter even as her relationship with Floyd is becoming more serious. Jewell’s (I Found You, 2017, etc.) latest thriller moves at a brisk pace even as she plays with narrative structure: The book is split into three sections, including a first one which alternates chapters between the time of Ellie’s disappearance and the present and a second section that begins as Laurel and Floyd meet. Both of these sections primarily focus on Laurel. In the third section, Jewell alternates narrators and moments in time: The narrator switches to alternating first-person points of view (told by Poppy’s mother and Floyd) interspersed with third-person narration of Ellie’s experiences and Laurel’s discoveries in the present. All of these devices serve to build palpable tension, but the structure also contributes to how deeply disturbing the story becomes. At times, the characters and the emotional core of the events are almost obscured by such quick maneuvering through the weighty plot.
Dark and unsettling, this novel’s end arrives abruptly even as readers are still moving at a breakneck speed.Pub Date: April 24, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-5464-5
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2018
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.
A man walks out of a bar and his life becomes a kaleidoscope of altered states in this science-fiction thriller.
Crouch opens on a family in a warm, resonant domestic moment with three well-developed characters. At home in Chicago’s Logan Square, Jason Dessen dices an onion while his wife, Daniela, sips wine and chats on the phone. Their son, Charlie, an appealing 15-year-old, sketches on a pad. Still, an undertone of regret hovers over the couple, a preoccupation with roads not taken, a theme the book will literally explore, in multifarious ways. To start, both Jason and Daniela abandoned careers that might have soared, Jason as a physicist, Daniela as an artist. When Charlie was born, he suffered a major illness. Jason was forced to abandon promising research to teach undergraduates at a small college. Daniela turned from having gallery shows to teaching private art lessons to middle school students. On this bracing October evening, Jason visits a local bar to pay homage to Ryan Holder, a former college roommate who just received a major award for his work in neuroscience, an honor that rankles Jason, who, Ryan says, gave up on his career. Smarting from the comment, Jason suffers “a sucker punch” as he heads home that leaves him “standing on the precipice.” From behind Jason, a man with a “ghost white” face, “red, pursed lips," and "horrifying eyes” points a gun at Jason and forces him to drive an SUV, following preset navigational directions. At their destination, the abductor forces Jason to strip naked, beats him, then leads him into a vast, abandoned power plant. Here, Jason meets men and women who insist they want to help him. Attempting to escape, Jason opens a door that leads him into a series of dark, strange, yet eerily familiar encounters that sometimes strain credibility, especially in the tale's final moments.
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.Pub Date: July 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-90422-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
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