An engaging mystery about environmental destruction.
A marine biologist joins a research team to investigate a lethal and rapidly spreading oceanic threat in Kirtland’s thriller.
Over the course of only a few weeks, a toxic algal bloom has spread from the Pensacola, Florida, coast to the Atlantic Ocean. It’s bright red and caused by microorganisms called dinoflagellates, and it’s killing sea creatures and producing life-threatening anaphylactic reactions in humans. In the midst of this environmental disaster, 25-year-old Diane Nelson, an expert on dinoflagellates, scores a postdoctoral position as a researcher with the Florida-based Ocean Science and Climatology Foundation. She joins a research team headed by the famous Shaun Jenson and Susan Landry, and she’s eager to use her skills to figure out the cause of the bloom and why it’s been resistant to environmental intervention. It’s a personal cause for her: She grew up on the Gulf Coast, and her mother and uncle still live there. However, her first day on the job is marked by chaos when a previous postdoc researcher, Matthew Toft, storms into the building with a gun,destroys his own research, and then dies by suicide in the lab, after saying, “I’m so sorry.” Meanwhile, the algal bloom spreads further into the ocean, contaminates the water supply of several coastal states, and starts leaking toxins into the air. Diane’s determined to come up with a plan to fix it—and also find out the reason behind Toft’s drastic actions. Kirtland uses her own background in marine biology and environmental science to spin an intriguing, action-packed tale about planetary ruin and human corruption. Diane is a smart, compelling protagonist; readers will enjoy her methodical research processes and the relationships she forms with her colleagues. Her quest to solve the mystery of the algal bloom is detailed, and the author enriches it with realistic dialogue. The supporting characters are also well developed and intriguing. Overall, readers are sure to find the real-world science behind this well-paced story fascinating—and existentially terrifying.
An engaging mystery about environmental destruction.Pub Date: Sept. 19, 2024
ISBN: 9781685134839
Page Count: 322
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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