An ideologically simplistic but engrossing Christian thriller.
A kidnapping tests a preacher’s faith in this novel.
McIntosh’s story opens with every husband’s worst nightmare: a kidnapped wife. Northeast Mississippi preacher Alan Livingston gets a message from his brother, Gary, a police detective. During a subsequent phone call, Gary tells the preacher that Alan’s 7-year-old son, Riley, showed up at the house of the detective and his wife, Beth, in a panic. Riley informed the couple that his mother, Anna, told him to run. Gary investigated and concluded that Anna was abducted. Alan consults with his brother and other friends in order to find out all he can about the crime. They soon apprehend a man named Larry Reed, who’s involved with the abduction just enough to give Alan an ominous warning: The kidnappers harbor a deep hatred of preachers. The author regularly shifts the thriller’s focus to show readers Anna’s experience; she’s unharmed but steadily guarded by an armed woman named Mrs. Bosco. At one point, Anna hears one of her kidnappers say: “The fewer Christians in the world, the better the world will be.” In the days that follow, Alan retreats to his church’s religious compound in the backwoods of Tishomingo County except when he’s fulfilling his preaching duties. McIntosh unfolds these two plot strands with a good ear for dialogue, although the casual pace will surprise many readers; they may also wonder why Alan is working and even going fishing while his wife’s fate remains unknown. Likewise, some will find the persecution narrative the author works into the plot strange. Alan confidently reports things like “About 75 percent of all religious intolerance is directed at Christianity,” “One out of nine Christians experiences persecution,” and “Persecution is coming to America and has, in fact, already started here.” But the faith that sustains Alan and Anna through their ordeal will appeal to McIntosh’s fellow Christians. In addition, the author’s orchestration of the larger plot against the preacher is well executed, and the cast is full of intriguing characters.
An ideologically simplistic but engrossing Christian thriller.Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-973698-07-4
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Westbow Press
Review Posted Online: June 4, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Feeney improves on her debut with a taut suspense plot, many gleeful twists and turns, and suspects galore.
A news presenter and a police detective are brought together by murders in the British village where they both grew up.
There is precious little that can be revealed about the plot of Feeney’s third novel without spoilers, as the author has woven surprises and plot twists and suspicious linkages into nearly every one of her brief, first-person chapters, written in three alternating narrative voices. “Hers” is Anna Andrews, a wannabe anchor on a BBC news program whose lucky break comes when the body of one of her school friends is found brutally murdered in their hometown, a woodsy little spot called Blackdown. “His” is DCI Jack Harper, head of the Major Crime Team in Blackdown, where major crimes were rather few until now. The third is unnamed but clearly the killer’s. Happily, none of the three is an unreliable narrator—good thing because plenty of people are sick of that—but none is exactly 100% forthcoming either. Which only makes sense, because you can't have reveals without secrets. In a small town like Blackdown, everybody knows everybody, so it’s not too surprising that Anna and Jack have a tragic past or that each has connections to all the victims and suspects while not being totally free from suspicion themselves. Who is that sneaky third narrator? On the way to figuring that out, expect high school mean girls, teen lesbian action, mutilated corpses, nasty things happening to kittens, and—as seems de rigueur in British thrillers—plenty of drinking and wisecracks, sometimes in tandem. “Sadly, my sister has the same taste in wine as she does in men; too cheap, too young, and headache-inducing.”
Feeney improves on her debut with a taut suspense plot, many gleeful twists and turns, and suspects galore.Pub Date: July 28, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26608-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2020
BOOK TO SCREEN
A captivating novel.
On the cusp of motherhood, a woman faces peril.
Annie is 37 weeks pregnant, shopping for a crib at IKEA, when suddenly she feels a terrible jolt, “a wave underneath me,” she thinks, “lifting me up.” An earthquake has hit Portland. In her assured debut novel, Pattee follows Annie through a horrific day: With wreckage all around her, she is intent on making her way to find her husband. She has miles to walk, it’s hot, she’s hungry and thirsty and afraid. She’s alone, and yet not alone, because she’s carrying a child, her precious Bean. “How did we get here, Bean?,” she asks. “You and me, IKEA, Monday morning, AISLE 8, BIN 31, hand on metal rack, eyes wide in fear, body tensed like a firecracker about to explode?” As she trudges across devastating landscapes—collapsed houses, bridges, and schools; supermarkets and convenience stores overrun by looters; bodies of the wounded and dead—Annie answers that question by beginning 17 years earlier, when she fell in love with Bean’s father, Dom, and they set out together to fulfill their dreams of becoming stars: she, a playwright; he, an actor. But Annie gave up writing, and Dom, while tirelessly auditioning, works at a cafe. Annie worries, as she walks, about their lack of money “to have a baby, much less feed a baby, much less house a baby, much less pay somebody to watch said baby.” She worries that they’ll never be able to afford a home of their own, with real estate prices ballooning. She worries about her ability for mothering, for being a “lifelong cheerleader” for her husband, and about realizing their dashed dreams. Recounting Annie’s precarious journey across the city and into her past, Pattee reveals that the quake has upended more than the earth.
A captivating novel.Pub Date: March 25, 2025
ISBN: 9781668055472
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Marysue Rucci Books
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
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