A pulpy, entertaining throwback about bad men and real monsters.
The unlikeliest of monster hunters teams up with her uncle, a burned-out Vietnam vet, seeking revenge.
Feeling his oats after the knockout twofer of Fever House (2023) and its sequel, The Devil by Name (2024), Rosson returns with an even grungier throwback, dressed up as a vampire-infested road novel. In December 1975, just outside Portland, Oregon, roughneck bartender Duane Minor knows he’s on thin ice. His wife, Heidi, a college student who dreams of becoming a writer, is none too pleased with his PTSD and burgeoning drinking problem. Duane is managing to just hold down his in-laws’ bar, the Last Call Tavern, but he knows something funny is going on with the business. Meanwhile, Heidi and Duane are both trying to connect with Heidi’s 13-year-old niece, Julia, who was reluctantly sent to them after her mother murdered her stepfather. It’s a rough scene made worse when Duane has a bad run-in at the bar one night with a bunch of bikers led by one John Varley. After the century-old Varley viciously dismembers both Heidi and her parents, Duane and Julia hit the road seeking vengeance. For horror fans, this is closer to crime fiction than loftier vampire fare—think Richard Lange’s terrific outlier Rovers (2021) or From Dusk Till Dawn in lieu of tortured immortals in velvet capes. Julia’s character takes a dramatic turn after they encounter a sanctuary dubbed the Children’s Museum, led by an ancient, lonely creature called Adeline. Even as he and Julia navigate this bizarre subculture, Duane’s defining characteristic remains the conflict between his inner demons and his outer ones. “You want that man to come forward, that killer I was, but I’ll drown if I do it. I’ll die,” he swears. Meanwhile, John Varley and his psychotic “thrall” leave a bloody trail across the country, chased by one broken man and a little girl with nothing but half a dozen silver bullets to their names.
A pulpy, entertaining throwback about bad men and real monsters.Pub Date: Sept. 9, 2025
ISBN: 9780593733400
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
Starts with a bang and closes with a knockout punch of an ending.
A violent attack hijacks a woman’s memory in this novel of domestic suspense.
McFadden wastes no time pulling the trigger in this harrowing story that starts with gunfire then swiftly propels readers into a crack tale of secrets and misdirection. Originally self-published in 2016, the book carries the same formidable weight as McFadden’s later novels featuring unsuspecting women who lose their power then fight to recapture it—mostly from men who have betrayed them. That formula perfectly fits Dr. Charlotte McKenna, a 37-year-old dermatologist who isn’t looking for love until the most handsome man she’s ever seen begins to woo her. There are warning signs about Clark Douglas and Charlotte overlooks them to her detriment—but is he a killer? The novel has dual timelines split between events leading up to the day Charlotte barely survives a head wound meant to kill her and the months afterward, when she struggles to reclaim her memory and her mobility. In real life, McFadden is a physician trained to treat brain injuries. Her expertise gives Charlotte’s rehabilitation authenticity, and her writing talent makes it interesting and engaging. As good as that timeline is, readers will yearn to get back to the alternate timeline about who wants Charlotte dead. It’s only a matter of time before Charlotte starts to remember who tried to kill her, and the clock is ticking toward their next attempt. McFadden dishes up plenty of suspects: Charlotte’s secretive husband, Clark; a former patient turned stalker who confronts Charlotte on her honeymoon; and the angry husband of a patient who blames Charlotte for his wife leaving him. Though the story is delicious and dark, McFadden brightens things up with a possible love interest for Charlotte and a surprise ending sure to please the author’s many fans.
Starts with a bang and closes with a knockout punch of an ending.Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249617
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: July 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2026
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.
Dead bodies turn up in the first sentence of the prologue in McFadden’s latest domestic thriller.
The mystery of who died is at the pulsating heart of this propulsive tale. As Chapter 1 begins, Naomi arrives home to find the locks changed on the front door of the gorgeous home she shares with her husband, Jeremy, and their 5-year-old son, Teddy. Jeremy steps out the front door and convinces Naomi to move out while he has their home renovated, a plan Naomi knows nothing about. It’s all a ruse, though, as the next day Jeremy tells her he wants a divorce. Naomi is shellshocked and soon discovers that Jeremy is having an affair with Veronica, a beautiful younger woman. What seems at first like a stereotypical story about a man who leaves his wife turns into something else when Naomi decides she’ll do anything to get Veronica away from Jeremy and Teddy, and Veronica decides to fight for what she thinks she deserves. Fans of stalker novels will cringe with delight as creepy things start to happen. Teddy’s stuffed elephant, a gift from Veronica, is found impaled on a kitchen knife; Naomi suspects Jeremy is gaslighting her and that Veronica tried to poison her. A weird confrontation among Jeremy, Veronica, and Naomi at Teddy’s birthday party, to which Naomi shows up uninvited, is priceless. There are three main characters, and any or all of them may be unreliable narrators. Packing the plot with dark, gasp-inducing twists, McFadden outdoes herself in a story about how highly emotional people engage in risky behavior to get what they want—but in this novel, for better or worse, not everyone will survive.
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249631
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK TO SCREEN
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