Overly intricate character work hobbles a crafty plot.
Fraser’s (Frozen Statues, 2017, etc.) thriller follows a pair of private investigators as their respective workloads converge on a killer.
In Toronto, private investigators Samantha McNamara and Reece Hash are engaged. Sam is pursuing her doctoral degree and hopes to get an internship at the Serenity Clinic under neuropsychiatrist Dr. Emily Armstrong. Reece is a legal articling student assigned to “audit police due diligence” in several “closed sudden-death cases.” Busying their lives further is a new puppy, Pepin, and the siblings Eli and Danny Watson, who form the technologically savvy portion of the investigative team. At the clinic, Sam is offered the internship, but only if she’s willing to help deprogram 17-year-old Fadiya Basha, survivor of the Bueton Sanctuary cult. Fadiya believes that the cult’s deceased leader, Mussani, visits her at night. She’s also eight weeks pregnant, which shouldn’t be possible. Meanwhile, Reece learns that drone sightings connect his cases. As the two PIs proceed, each must decide whether to navigate treacherous moral terrain for the greater good. Fraser’s latest Perdition Games thriller augments plotlines with domestic travails, including the noisy, destructive Pepin and Sam’s Alzheimer’s-stricken mother, Grace, who insists on planning an elaborate wedding for her daughter. While these elements help the main characters grow within the series, they also slow momentum. Chapters follow Sam, Reece, and someone named Blu, whose tragic upbringing in Louisiana borders on the Dickensian. Fraser toys with readers, creating victims who are so repulsive that we practically cheer their demises. A tangle of subplots—featuring the gruff Dr. Mathias Beauregard and the young science prodigy Azar Basha—helps obscure the connecting element between Sam’s and Reece’s cases. Fraser drains some of the menace from her killer by providing an overly elaborate backstory. However, excellent use of Eli, who has Asperger syndrome, bolsters the final third. Readers will be entertained if they can reconcile the driving events in the present with the melodrama of the flashbacks.
Overly intricate character work hobbles a crafty plot.Pub Date: Oct. 19, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9947742-6-2
Page Count: 399
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 11, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
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