A highflying, cautionary tale of unrestrained technology—some narrative assembly required.
A timely adventure explores corporate malfeasance, executive greed and the deadly consequences of unmanned aerial vehicles gone astray.
When a private undercover firm is hired to investigate the deteriorating work environment at a respected U.S. military contractor, top managers stand to lose everything. The assignment to uncover the cause of poor morale and declining stock prices at NanoLance becomes a race to prevent further deaths caused by rogue drones. Aided by an interesting format for chapter delineation, Wolfe keeps readers turning the pages as the action blows past with little meaningful character development. The novel highlights Wolfe’s self-stated love for technology—exacting descriptions of electronic spyware, sophisticated communication devices and unmanned aerial vehicles figure prominently in the story, with most technology described in more detail than the living, breathing characters who appear on the scene with little to no background. They’re just there to keep the story running. The brief description of heroine Alex Hoffmann’s strange childhood begs the question of how her parents shifted from loving to startlingly abusive. For the other characters, no history is offered at all. Why did “The Agency” work so hard to recruit Alex for their team—indeed, what is “The Agency”? Opening chapters suggest a government connection, but that direction stalls. The top brass’ behavior at NanoLance becomes too pathological to be plausible, although Wolfe cleverly exposes the peculiar effects of fear on quality in the work place. Stylistically, the narrative has a tendency to stumble in awkward phrasing—“Janet Tempelton … was only five minutes away of Mrs. Kingsley’s address”; “She had no idea when the time had flown”—which cools the plot’s otherwise fiery jets.
A highflying, cautionary tale of unrestrained technology—some narrative assembly required.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2011
ISBN: 978-0984384624
Page Count: 348
Publisher: Italics Publishing
Review Posted Online: Feb. 6, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Above-average formula fiction, making full display of the author’s strong suits: sense of place, compassion for characters...
Female rivalry is again the main preoccupation of Hannah’s latest Pacific Northwest sob saga (Firefly Lane, 2008, etc.).
At Water’s Edge, the family seat overlooking Hood Canal, Vivi Ann, youngest and prettiest of the Grey sisters and a champion horsewoman, has persuaded embittered patriarch Henry to turn the tumbledown ranch into a Western-style equestrian arena. Eldest sister Winona, a respected lawyer in the nearby village of Oyster Shores, hires taciturn ranch hand Dallas Raintree, a half-Native American. Middle sister Aurora, stay-at-home mother of twins, languishes in a dull marriage. Winona, overweight since adolescence, envies Vivi, whose looks get her everything she wants, especially men. Indeed, Winona’s childhood crush Luke recently proposed to Vivi. Despite Aurora’s urging (her principal role is as sisterly referee), Winona won’t tell Vivi she loves Luke. Yearning for Dallas, Vivi stands up Luke to fall into bed with the enigmatic, tattooed cowboy. Winona snitches to Luke: engagement off. Vivi marries Dallas over Henry’s objections. The love-match triumphs, and Dallas, though scarred by child abuse, is an exemplary father to son Noah. One Christmas Eve, the town floozy is raped and murdered. An eyewitness and forensic evidence incriminate Dallas. Winona refuses to represent him, consigning him to the inept services of a public defender. After a guilty verdict, he’s sentenced to life without parole. A decade later, Winona has reached an uneasy truce with Vivi, who’s still pining for Dallas. Noah is a sullen teen, Aurora a brittle but resigned divorcée. Noah learns about the Seattle Innocence Project. Could modern DNA testing methods exonerate Dallas? Will Aunt Winona redeem herself by reopening the case? The outcome, while predictable, is achieved with more suspense and less sentimental histrionics than usual for Hannah.
Above-average formula fiction, making full display of the author’s strong suits: sense of place, compassion for characters and understanding of family dynamics.Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-312-36410-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2008
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
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