This thriller can’t decide if it wants to entertain or convert.
This bold Christian thriller sees a covert organization go to war against the supernatural.
In 1994, Dominic “Nick” Moreau’s wife and child were killed by what he described as a werewolf. The authorities, though, believed him to be the true murderer and locked him up. Enter Christopher Griffin, who interviewed Nick in prison, posing as an FBI agent, and explained his work for Knightlight—a group in God’s service that battles supernatural evil. Griffin invited Nick—himself a dedicated Christian with military experience—to join. Now codenamed Rock, Nick leads a Trinity squad that eliminates vampires, werewolves and other demonic hybrids fallen from God’s grace. Rock’s latest mission involves investigating Malcolm Carson, a famous sasquatch hunter who has assembled a massive hunting party to find his quarry in Montgomery County, Ind. The area has suffered a rash of grisly slayings that remind Rock of the beast that killed his family. Responsible for the chaos is Darlene, the mild-mannered leader of a satanic cult who helps foment the darkness that’s been brewing since Israel became a nation in 1947. Rock’s squad intends to shine a light on Darlene while protecting the misguided Carson and his lovely daughter, Crystal. Debut author Rossi brings clean action and humor to the adventure, which occasionally pops with one-liners: “Whatever Hell spat out, Knightlight was there to engage and return to its pit.” But much of the prose can be stilted: “The broad-brimmed hat that covered his head had absorbed much sweat in the heat of the day and was finally drying in the slight night breeze of the still very warm evening.” The largest problems, though, are the defensive political screeds that interrupt the narrative. For instance, a discussion on terrorism is full of bolded, italicized phrases, such as: “Freedom itself was shamed that day.” There’s also a tendency toward intellectual blandness, culminating in the line: “Artists, Crystal thought, who can understand them?”
This thriller can’t decide if it wants to entertain or convert.Pub Date: April 26, 2013
ISBN: 978-1452572222
Page Count: 498
Publisher: BalboaPress
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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