Bookended by bloodbaths, the novel ends just when it seems the real story has started cooking.
The real, brief history of the Republic of West Florida is the inspiration for this gory tale of 21st-century secession.
Wascom continues the saga of the Woolsack family—the subject of his three previous novels, most recently The New Inheritors (2018)—this time in the near future. The Woolsacks have twice attempted and failed to start a breakaway community called West Florida; the idea now belongs to far-right politician Troy Yarbrough, who is close to turning the Florida panhandle into the 51st state. Bearing witness is 13-year-old Rally Woolsack. He’s a bit like Harry Potter, if his father was killed by his mother, who was then killed by Rally’s cousin, the mysterious Destiny. Like Potter, Rally goes to live with his cruel uncle, but his deliverance comes in a firefight that leaves his uncle’s head blown off, blood “seeping all over the blacktop.” Rally’s savior is his father’s brother, Rodney, a professional gunfighter in a U.S. where dueling is legal. Destiny, now known as the Governor, plots a resistance against Troy. There’s an immense amount of information in these 272 pages. Wascom introduces more Woolsacks and Yarbroughs than most readers could keep track of. And there are the history lessons about the Republic of West Florida, environmental degradation, and bomb testing. This leaves little room for Rally, who has attributes (bisexual, fat) but not much of a personality beyond the novel’s narrative voice. That voice, which spans pulp and Southern Gothic registers, can make up for a lot when it’s not too overblown. The pleasure of the novel is in sentences like this one: “Looking out the scarred and road-burnt visor of the racing helmet, she saw everything through a deep red mist, the atmosphere of a planet with gunpowder sands and bloody skies....” Wascom’s novel is not for the faint of heart: There’s sexual abuse, bestiality, torture, and a man’s head “dangl[ing] like a hangnail off his shoulder.”
Bookended by bloodbaths, the novel ends just when it seems the real story has started cooking.Pub Date: May 21, 2024
ISBN: 9780802162847
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Black Cat/Grove
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2024
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.
A year in the life of the No. 2 boarding school in America—up from No. 19 last year!
Rumors of Hilderbrand’s retirement were greatly exaggerated, it turns out, since not only has she not gone out to pasture, she’s started over in high school, with her daughter Shelby Cunningham as co-author. As their delicious new book opens, it’s Move-In Day at Tiffin Academy, and Head of School Audre Robinson is warmly welcoming the returning and new students to the New England campus, the latter group including a rare midstream addition to the junior class. Brainiac Charley Hicks is transferring from public school in Maryland to a spot that opened up when one of the school’s most beloved students died by suicide the preceding year. She will be joining a large, diverse cast of adult and teenage characters—queen bees, jealous second-stringers, boozehounds young and old, secret lesbians, people chasing the wrong people chasing other wrong people—all of them royally screwed when an app called Zip Zap appears and starts blasting everyone’s secrets all over campus. How the heck…? Meanwhile, it seems so unlikely that Tiffin has jumped up to the No. 2 spot in the boarding-school rankings that a high-profile magazine launches an investigation, and even the head is worried that there may have been payola involved. The school has a reputation for being more social than academic, and this quality gets an exciting new exclamation point when the resident millionaire bad boy opens a high-style secret speakeasy for select juniors in a forgotten basement. It’s called Priorities. Exactly. One problem: Cinnamon Peters’ mysterious suicide hangs over the book in an odd way, especially since the note she left for her closest male friend is not to be opened for another year—and isn’t. This is surely a setup for a sequel, but it’s a bit frustrating here, and bobs sort of shallowly along amid the general high spirits.
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9780316567855
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
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