A serial-killer thriller involving a crisis intervention social worker in Oregon, by an author with a decade’s experience in field.
When 23-month-old Sara Germane is brought into the emergency room of Scottsdale Memorial Hospital and dies shortly thereafter, social worker Emily Martin recognizes all the earmarks of longstanding child abuse, making the death a murder. After reporting the case to the Department of Children and Family Services, she is startled when the child’s mother is brought to the hospital, the victim of a vicious assault and kidnapping that’s eventually linked to several other cases in the area—apparently the work of a local serial killer. Soon Emily finds herself deeply entrenched in more ways than one when she crosses paths with FBI agent Seth Brady who has his own personal reasons for pursuing the case—his sister was one of the victims. Both Emily and Seth are hiding details about their pasts from one another. Emily becomes a witness to the latest murder as it happens within the hospital, but a bash on the head makes her unable to remember. As Brady, local detective Richard Dixon and a team of investigators race against time to catch their killer, Emily holds the key to the monster’s identity—and the murderer is determined to destroy his greatest threat before she can unlock that last terrifying memory. Although seasoned mystery readers may guess whodunit early on, assured storytelling, a brisk pace and a good cast of characters sustain the interest throughout. Police and hospital procedurals are nicely detailed and believable, aided by the author’s expertise. A great detraction, however, is sloppy or nonexistent copyediting. Repeatedly misused words (“defiantly” instead of “definitely,” “option” instead of “opinion,” “women” instead of “woman”), typos, repetition in sentences (“How could he begin anew, when he had left something left unfinished?”), improper verbs and the like are liberally sprinkled throughout the manuscript. The meticulous care the author gave to structure and pacing are desperately needed for proofing. Paisley-Pardon shows promise and storytelling talent in her entertaining debut murder mystery.
Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2011
ISBN: 978-1463443191
Page Count: 308
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Review Posted Online: Feb. 20, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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