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
More of the same: Sparks has his recipe, and not a bit of it is missing here. It’s the literary equivalent of high fructose...
Sparks (The Longest Ride, 2013, etc.) serves up another heaping helping of sentimental Southern bodice-rippage.
Gone are the blondes of yore, but otherwise the Sparks-ian formula is the same: a decent fellow from a good family who’s gone through some rough patches falls in love with a decent girl from a good family who’s gone through some rough patches—and is still suffering the consequences. The guy is innately intelligent but too quick to throw a punch, the girl beautiful and scary smart. If you hold a fatalistic worldview, then you’ll know that a love between them can end only in tears. If you hold a Sparks-ian one, then true love will prevail, though not without a fight. Voilà: plug in the character names, and off the story goes. In this case, Colin Hancock is the misunderstood lad who’s decided to reform his hard-knuckle ways but just can’t keep himself from connecting fist to face from time to time. Maria Sanchez is the dedicated lawyer in harm’s way—and not just because her boss is a masher. Simple enough. All Colin has to do is punch the partner’s lights out: “The sexual harassment was bad enough, but Ken was a bully as well, and Colin knew from his own experience that people like that didn’t stop abusing their power unless someone made them. Or put the fear of God into them.” No? No, because bound up in Maria’s story, wrinkled with the doings of an equally comely sister, there’s a stalker and a closet full of skeletons. Add Colin’s back story, and there’s a perfect couple in need of constant therapy, as well as a menacing cop. Get Colin and Maria to smooching, and the plot thickens as the storylines entangle. Forget about love—can they survive the evil that awaits them out in the kudzu-choked woods?
More of the same: Sparks has his recipe, and not a bit of it is missing here. It’s the literary equivalent of high fructose corn syrup, stickily sweet but irresistible.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4555-2061-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
Though all the surface elements are in place, Picoult falters in her exploration of what turns a quiet kid into a murderer.
Picoult’s 14th novel (after The Tenth Circle, 2006, etc.) of a school shooting begins with high-voltage excitement, then slows by the middle, never regaining its initial pace or appeal.
Peter Houghton, 17, has been the victim of bullying since his first day of kindergarten, made all the more difficult by two factors: In small-town Sterling, N.H., Peter is in high school with the kids who’ve tormented him all his life; and his all-American older brother eggs the bullies on. Peter retreats into a world of video games and computer programming, but he’s never able to attain the safety of invisibility. And then one day he walks into Sterling High with a knapsack full of guns, kills ten students and wounds many others. Peter is caught and thrown in jail, but with over a thousand witnesses and video tape of the day, it will be hard work for the defense to clear him. His attorney, Jordan McAfee, hits on the only approach that might save the unlikable kid—a variation of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder caused by bullying. Thrown into the story is Judge Alex Cormier, and her daughter Josie, who used to be best friends with Peter until the popular crowd forced the limits of her loyalty. Also found dead was her boyfriend Matt, but Josie claims she can’t remember anything from that day. Picoult mixes McAfee’s attempt to build a defense with the mending relationship of Alex and Josie, but what proves a more intriguing premise is the response of Peter’s parents to the tragedy. How do you keep loving your son when he becomes a mass murderer? Unfortunately, this question, and others, remain, as the novel relies on repetition (the countless flashbacks of Peter’s victimization) rather than fresh insight. Peter fits the profile, but is never fully fleshed out beyond stereotype. Usually so adept at shaping the big stories with nuance, Picoult here takes a tragically familiar event, pads it with plot, but leaves out the subtleties of character.
Though all the surface elements are in place, Picoult falters in her exploration of what turns a quiet kid into a murderer.Pub Date: March 6, 2007
ISBN: 0-7434-9672-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2007
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