by Kenneth Michaels ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2015
Bodies keep piling up and things keep getting worse for Detective Scott, but readers will smile (and shiver) right to the...
A gay cop investigates a string of murders as he puts his own life back together in this winning debut novel.
Nick Scott is a crackerjack Chicago police detective and the host of the city’s newest morning show, The Gay Detective, in which he interviews a different gay celebrity each week. When his first guest, author Harold Sapoti, is found dead, slumped over a stool (“The perp had placed Harold’s book on his butt, so that the first thing you saw was the title, Bottoms Up”), it looks like a clear-cut hate crime. But when other people close to Nick start turning up with their throats slashed and his own house is set ablaze, things look more personal. Then someone trashes the studio where Nick films his show and he discovers a dire warning: “a photo of my face marked with a large block red X that said YOU’RE NEXT!” As Detective Scott’s life deteriorates dramatically around him, he finds himself sharing a house with his new partner, the sweet-natured, heterosexual slob Detective Norm Malone; to put it mildly, they have very different views on housekeeping. With the help of Norm, Nick’s boss Lt. Brodsky, and an Indian dwarf named Dr. Jojo, Nick tries to both solve the case and his own problems. The mystery itself is a genuine puzzler, and although Michaels addresses some quite serious subjects, he frequently lightens the mood with a joke (or two, or three) when readers most need it. This technique occasionally falters through overuse, though, and readers may be left unsure how the violent homophobia of one chapter fits with the sitcom-style banter between upscale Nick and bargain-basement Norm in another. What isn’t in doubt, however, is both characters’ lovability—or the anxiousness that readers will feel as they hope for things to turn out all right. As Nick and Norm close in on a surprise suspect, the pages practically turn themselves.
Bodies keep piling up and things keep getting worse for Detective Scott, but readers will smile (and shiver) right to the end.Pub Date: July 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5086216-9-0
Page Count: -
Publisher: LaMancha Press
Review Posted Online: July 23, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Max Brooks ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 16, 2020
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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New York Times Bestseller
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
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BOOK TO SCREEN
by Colleen Hoover ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 2, 2016
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of...
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IndieBound Bestseller
Hoover’s (November 9, 2015, etc.) latest tackles the difficult subject of domestic violence with romantic tenderness and emotional heft.
At first glance, the couple is edgy but cute: Lily Bloom runs a flower shop for people who hate flowers; Ryle Kincaid is a surgeon who says he never wants to get married or have kids. They meet on a rooftop in Boston on the night Ryle loses a patient and Lily attends her abusive father’s funeral. The provocative opening takes a dark turn when Lily receives a warning about Ryle’s intentions from his sister, who becomes Lily’s employee and close friend. Lily swears she’ll never end up in another abusive home, but when Ryle starts to show all the same warning signs that her mother ignored, Lily learns just how hard it is to say goodbye. When Ryle is not in the throes of a jealous rage, his redeeming qualities return, and Lily can justify his behavior: “I think we needed what happened on the stairwell to happen so that I would know his past and we’d be able to work on it together,” she tells herself. Lily marries Ryle hoping the good will outweigh the bad, and the mother-daughter dynamics evolve beautifully as Lily reflects on her childhood with fresh eyes. Diary entries fancifully addressed to TV host Ellen DeGeneres serve as flashbacks to Lily’s teenage years, when she met her first love, Atlas Corrigan, a homeless boy she found squatting in a neighbor’s house. When Atlas turns up in Boston, now a successful chef, he begs Lily to leave Ryle. Despite the better option right in front of her, an unexpected complication forces Lily to cut ties with Atlas, confront Ryle, and try to end the cycle of abuse before it’s too late. The relationships are portrayed with compassion and honesty, and the author’s note at the end that explains Hoover’s personal connection to the subject matter is a must-read.
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of the survivors.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1036-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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