The mutual hatred between Det. Skip Langdon and New Orleans Prince of Darkness Earl Jacomine that seethed throughout The Kindness of Strangers (1996) comes to a boil again in this saga of The Juror, a high-toned vigilante who executes criminals the law can't touch and writes principled self-defenses to the police. It's bad enough when The Juror takes down recently acquitted wife-killer Billy Ray Hutchison, but when he goes after the murderer of promising new police superintendent Albert Goodlett (a vengeance just about everybody in town privately applauds), he's clearly on a collision course with Skip. That's fine with Skip, who's convinced The Juror is Jacomine—and fine with Jacomine, who has no higher goal in life than to get revenge on this despised female cop. Caught in the middle are Jacomine's fearful wife Tourmaline; his first wife Rosemarie Owens (recently single again courtesy of The Juror); Rosemarie's crazy son Daniel; Tourmaline's scarcely less crazy son Isaac (a.k.a. The White Monk); Daniel's daughter Lovelace (who first makes her appearance getting kidnapped by her father, before things really get strange); and Dorise Bourgeois, widowed by a shot Skip fired in self-defense. Talented Smith's canvas is extravagantly broad, but this time, at least, bigger isn't better; the epic confrontation between Skip and Jacomine feels suspiciously like Pearl White and the Scarlet Claw. Late-breaking news flash: Jacomine escapes from the apocalyptic conflagration that brings down the rest of the house. Looks like every crook in New Orleans who isn't in with Jacomine will get a bye for at least one more installment.
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-449-91000-8
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1997
A top-notch psychological thriller.
In Hoag’s (The 9th Girl, 2013, etc.) latest, talented young newscaster Dana Nolan is left to navigate a psychological maze after escaping a serial killer.
While recuperating at home in Shelby Mills, Indiana, Dana meets her former high school classmates John Villante and Tim Carver. Football hero Tim is ashamed of flunking out of West Point, and now he’s a sheriff’s deputy. After Iraq and Afghanistan tours, John’s home with PTSD, "angry and bitter and dark." Dana survived abduction by serial killer Doc Holiday, but she still suffers from the gruesome attack by "the man who ruined her life, destroyed her career, shattered her sense of self, damaged her brain and her face." What binds the trio is their friend Casey Grant, who's been missing five years, perhaps also a Holiday victim, even if "[t]he odds against that kind of coincidence had to be astronomical." Hoag’s first 100 pages are a gut-wrenching dissection of the aftereffects of traumatic brain injury: Dana is plagued by "[f]ear, panic, grief, and anger" and haunted by fractured memories and nightmares. "Before Dana had believed in the inherent good in people. After Dana knew firsthand their capacity for evil." Impulsive and paranoid, Dana obsesses over linking Casey’s disappearance to Holiday, with her misfiring brain convincing her that "finding the truth about what had happened to Casey [was] her chance of redemption." But then Hoag tosses suspects into the narrative faster than Dana can count: Roger Mercer, Dana’s self-absorbed state senator stepfather; Mack Villante, who left son John with "no memories of his father that didn’t include drunkenness and cruelty"; even Hardy, the hard-bitten, cancer-stricken detective who investigated Casey’s disappearance. Tense, tightly woven, with every minor character, from Dana’s fiercely protective aunt to Mercer’s pudgy campaign chief, ratcheting up the tension, Hoag’s narrative explodes with an unexpected but believable conclusion.
A top-notch psychological thriller.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-525-95454-5
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Oct. 22, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2014
Period details and charm abound in a mystery that packs some real surprises.
Who killed the milkman?
Unlike other companies that keep cows in crowded and unhealthy conditions right in New York City and add things like chalk and plaster to make their milk look better, Clarence Pritchard’s milk processing firm delivers pasteurized, unadulterated milk from upstate farms. The Pritchards’ daughter, Theda, is married to Nelson Ellsworth, whose parents are neighbors of detectives Sarah and Frank Malloy (Murder on Union Square, 2018, etc.). Before they attend a dinner party at the Ellsworths’ home, the Malloys are warned that Pritchard is seriously nettled that the upcoming year of 1900 will not be celebrated as the turn of the century. When Pritchard’s body is found strangled on the first day of the new year (though not the first of the new century) after he’s spent the night pestering people about his theory, it’s clear that someone’s paid off the police to ignore the case. Theda demands an investigation by Malloy and his partner, Gino Donatelli, both of whom were New York police officers before Frank’s sudden wealth encouraged him to open a private investigation agency. Sarah, a former midwife from a society family, subsidizes a home for unwed mothers whose recent clients include Jocelyn Vane. Because Jocelyn’s wealthy parents won’t let her keep her child, Sarah hatches a plot to marry her to Black Jack Robinson, a handsome, wealthy, cultured criminal with aspirations to join society. Pritchard’s murder is still unsolved when his son, Harvey, is also strangled. Malloy discovers that Mrs. Pritchard had a longtime lover who poses as a family friend and that Harvey’s gambling addiction forced his father to allow someone to use their milk delivery wagons to move stolen goods. Since both deaths may be connected to deeper criminal enterprises, Malloy must be cautious in his investigation and rely on help from Robinson if he’s not to become the next victim.
Period details and charm abound in a mystery that packs some real surprises.Pub Date: April 30, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-399-58663-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
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