A crushingly relevant story that puts its readers in the shoes of the accused.
A Black teenager is wrongfully accused of murder in Delegal’s novel.
Fifteen-year-old Jason Royals is given a rare opportunity by his mother—the chance to skip church on Sunday to prepare for a job interview at a local Beau Rêve, Florida, pharmacy with his new crush, Kim. Dressed in nice khakis and with an added spring in his step from his air-bounce sneakers, Jason rushes across the street to beat traffic only to be stopped and forcibly arrested for “running while Black.” He shortly finds himself in the custody of John Marshall, a 10-year veteran of the police force anxious to end his tenure in homicide. Pressured by his role as an “upstanding” Black man, haunted by too much violence committed by too many young offenders, Marshall has no trouble believing that the high school student before him is a murderer. Worse, after a threatening trip into the woods with Marshall and his white partner, the traumatized Jason confesses to the crime. His only hope in a system stacked against him is that his attorney, Aaron Hampton, known as a “fierce advocate,” can get his confession dismissed and ensure that his time in jail only means a future delayed, not one denied. This timely novel is a vivid panic attack on the page, a fictional account of the real-life horror story too many young Black men face every day. Inspired by an actual crime in Jacksonville, Jason’s plight illustrates how rushed, abusive police work and racism override justice at every turn. Correcting such mistakes is a long, frustrating process, and the book places readers right there, in the cell and courtroom alongside its protagonist, to struggle with him and feel his anger, hopelessness, and sorely tested faith. The narrative excels at empathy and doesn’t only reserve it for Jason; Marshall isn’t portrayed as some stock serial villain, just another flawed character in an even more flawed system.
A crushingly relevant story that puts its readers in the shoes of the accused.Pub Date: Aug. 21, 2021
ISBN: 978-0578953809
Page Count: 366
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.
Character assassination reigns supreme, if not uncontested, in a Long Island suburb.
April Masterson loves her husband, corporate attorney Elliott; their 7-year-old, Bobby; and her YouTube channel, “April’s Sweet Secrets.” What she doesn’t love is whoever’s texting her warnings about how Bobby isn’t really in their backyard while she’s busy filming her videos or withering critiques of her baking show or veiled accusations about her past and threats about her present. Her best friend, former prosecutor Julie Bressler, may be bossy and opinionated, but surely she’d never turn on April this way. Who else might know enough to send April goodies like a picture of her kissing Mark Tanner, Bobby’s soccer coach? Though April struggles to get Elliot to take her ordeal seriously, even when she shows up at his office for a lunch date, he’s protected by his receptionist, Brianna Anderson, whose attachment to her boss goes far beyond loyalty. Then Julie turns on her; Maria Cooper, her friendly new next-door neighbor, turns on her; and in the most mind-boggling scene, Doris Kirkland, April’s mother, whose dementia has brought her to a nursing home, turns on her. McFadden releases an escalating series of toxins so deftly into the suburban atmosphere that it’s practically an anticlimax when someone gets killed and April instantly becomes the prime suspect. But that’s only a setup for the tale’s boldest move: switching its narrator from April to a fair-weather friend who frames the whole nightmare in dramatically different terms. As a special gift to her savviest fans, the author throws in an even more jolting epilogue that’s as hard to forget as it is to believe.
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249600
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
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