Former Time journalist Hull’s first novel paints a generic portrait of young love and trench warfare, framed by a bracingly unsentimental depiction of old age. The story moves forward simultaneously on three fronts, all chronicled in the diary of American veteran Patrick Delaney. At age 81, he recalls his experiences as a soldier during WWI, when his best friend, Daniel, died horribly after an assault on the German lines; and his brief, enchanted affair with Daniel’s lover, Julia, whom he met in France in 1928 while attending the dedication of a memorial monument. The battle scenes are adequate, but contemporary writers who venture into this arena must suffer comparison to Pat Barker’s breathtaking trilogy (The Ghost Road, 1995, etc.), and Hull falls short in both imaginative empathy and literary skill. Patrick’s account of his liaison with Julia, conducted as his unloved wife and cherished three-year-old son await him in a Paris hotel, fails to convince us that she’s as fabulous as he thinks. However—and this is a big however—the diary’s 1980 portions, chronicling Patrick’s life in a nursing home, have all the specificity and emotional weight the historical segments lack. Compare the bite of —The older I get, the more out of place I feel, like a weekend guest still loitering around the cottage on Sunday night because he’s got no place else to go— with the blandness of —How perfect she looked . . . with the kind of face you instinctively want to touch and kiss.— The lovelorn noodlings of Patrick and Julia aren—t nearly as interesting as the blunt, bitter depiction of physical decay and psychic regret that plague nearly every inhabitant of the Great Oaks Home for Assisted Living. A death scene there would have been a lot more realistic—and challenging—than the phonily romantic one Hull provides. Pretty stale stuff, but those perfectly pitched nursing-home scenes linger in the memory.
Pub Date: Feb. 15, 2000
ISBN: 0-385-33375-7
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2000
A promising start to a series, provided Roberts can flesh out her derivative heroine.
A young woman in hiding from the Russian mob faces a difficult decision when she falls in love with a cop.
Abigail, 28, lives alone in the bucolic hamlet of Bickford, Ark., in an isolated house, fortified with firearms, a state-of-the-art alarm system and a vicious dog named Bert. When the town’s genial police chief, Brooks, suspects Abigail is packing while shopping for gourmet groceries, his curiosity soon morphs into courtship. Although she finds herself drawn to Brooks and to his welcoming, bohemian family, Abigail dares not reveal that her real name is Liz—which is not the only way in which she appears to be Roberts’ answer to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Gifted with an eidetic memory, an IQ over 200 and an affinity for cool, calculated mayhem, Liz/Abigail is a skilled hacker and a highly paid security consultant. In her spare time she investigates the Russian mob and the crooked federal agents who are responsible for her current predicament; whenever possible, she throws virtual monkey wrenches into the mob’s Internet scams. When she witnesses an altercation between Brooks and the wastrel son of a local magnate, she’s thrust back into the horror of the last time she witnessed a crime. At 16, rebelling against an unloving, controlling mother, Liz and a girlfriend, Julie, visited a Chicago nightclub run by the Russian Mafia, where Ilya, son of gang kingpin Sergei, and Alexi, a cousin, seduced them with Cosmos. Later, at Alexi’s lakeside home, Liz was an unseen witness to a hit on Alexi by Sergei’s enforcers, who also killed Julie. Managing to escape, Liz was forced to run again when two dirty FBI agents destroyed her safe house and murdered her guards. A person of interest to both the Feds and the mob, she’s been on the lam for 12 years. Before they can marry, Brooks must help Liz come in from the cold.
A promising start to a series, provided Roberts can flesh out her derivative heroine.Pub Date: April 17, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-399-15912-1
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2012
A little slower-paced than the typical Roberts romantic mystery (Black Hills, 2009, etc.) but every bit as steamy. It may...
A dog trainer and a wood craftsman dance around love and danger in the Pacific Northwest.
Fiona Bristow is the only victim who got away from serial killer George Perry. Now a copycat, inspired and perhaps guided by the jailed Perry, is on her trail. After Perry murdered her fiancé, Fiona rebuilt her life as a dog trainer and search-and-rescue expert on lovely Orcas Island. She’s recently met talented woodworker Simon Doyle and his misbehaving puppy Jaws, and her dormant love life is about to revive as she and the reluctant Simon slowly build a complicated relationship. Though she’s done her best to overcome her fears and make herself whole again, this new series of killings, with herself as the ultimate target, can’t help but strain her nerves. As the police and FBI track the killer, a persistent reporter makes Fiona’s life more difficult by printing information about her life and location. Through it all, Fiona keeps working. As she continues to go on rescue missions with a team that may soon include Simon and Jaws, her friends help to keep her balanced. But ultimately it will be the trust she has built up with Simon and the talents of her dogs that will change her life forever.
A little slower-paced than the typical Roberts romantic mystery (Black Hills, 2009, etc.) but every bit as steamy. It may well add dog lovers to her legion of fans.Pub Date: July 7, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-399-15657-1
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: March 6, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2010
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