An impressive thriller by an author worth following.
Falling for the wrong man could prove life-threatening for an interior designer in this debut novel.
Davis’ unlikely protagonist is Kathryn Landry, whose life has gotten complicated quickly. Her cold, overbearing husband, Neil, has suddenly vanished. While the couple drifted apart, Neil tightly controlled their finances, including handling the transactions for Kathryn’s design firm. Assigned to Neil’s case is Detective Mike Williams, who failed to find Kathryn’s missing father 25 years earlier. Also offering to help is John Selton, a client of Kathryn’s who also runs a security firm and constantly flirts with her. Despite the search for her husband, Kathryn finds herself romantically drawn to both Mike and John, who can’t stand each other. Then her apartment and office get broken into, with the target a flash drive that only the two men know about, so one isn’t on the up-and-up. In addition, she discovers Neil had made plans to leave the country imminently with all their money and his mistress. Fortunately, Kathryn is supported, emotionally and financially, by her assistant-turned-partner, Marianne Patton, and her husband, Richard, who take in Kathryn. They help her sort out the chaos that surrounds her as she tries to decipher what Neil did that caused his disappearance and put her life in danger. She also meets her dying uncle, who fills in some of the holes in her history. With a novel heavy on dialogue, Davis has created a fast-paced narrative. She effectively uses her native Southern California as a backdrop, especially the ever present wildfires. Kathryn does seem to move on from her absent husband rather quickly, content to waffle between two intriguing new suitors. But considering how badly Neil treated her, that’s certainly understandable. In addition, all the mysteries in the heroine’s life improbably get tied up a little too neatly by the book’s end. Still, Davis deftly keeps readers as up in the air as Kathryn throughout this well-crafted tale.
An impressive thriller by an author worth following.Pub Date: June 19, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9990688-1-6
Page Count: 294
Publisher: Cinnamon & Sugar Press
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
