A riveting crime tale with a surprisingly effective multigenre approach.
A mobster has little time to find a kidnapped girl, thwart child sex traffickers, and prove himself innocent of murder in this sequel.
When someone abducts the granddaughter of Shinzo Tanaka, the Tanaka syndicate leader seeks help from Levi Yoder. A fixer for the Mafia’s Bianchi family in New York, Levi doesn’t initially know why Tanaka chose him to track down 5-year-old June. She’s the daughter of Tanaka’s dead son, Jun, and lives with her mom, Helen, in Maryland. The search for June is barely under way when feds pick up Levi and accuse him of murdering three FBI agents. They have no real evidence, but Levi agrees to be a cooperating witness and assist in finding the true killer. Meanwhile, June’s kidnapper demands $10 million within two weeks or Helen will never see her daughter again. Complicating matters is Levi’s personal mission to get abused immigrant children off the streets, provide them shelter, and help them secure U.S. citizenship. This ultimately results in threats from human traffickers in Flushing, Queens. But it also leads to a covert organization that wants to recruit Levi in taking down child sex traffickers, whose upcoming illicit deal will be taking place in mere weeks. Rothman (Darwin’s Cipher, 2019, etc.) deftly blends a few genres in this second installment of a series featuring Levi. The murders and abduction, for example, are shrouded in mystery while combating human traffickers generates ample action. Levi’s genius pal, Denny, shows off gadgets à la the James Bond films, with the narrative even comparing him to Q. The author deftly retains a coherent narrative by typically concentrating on one subplot at a time, like the one monopolizing the final act after another is all but resolved. With his mob ties, Levi is a flawed but likable protagonist. He’s involved in sometimes disturbingly violent deeds, but his desire to rescue children is noble. He’s also persistently cool; when an associate says Levi can’t save all the kids, he confidently responds: “I can try.”
A riveting crime tale with a surprisingly effective multigenre approach.Pub Date: March 31, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-09-227955-0
Page Count: 374
Publisher: Time Tunnel Media
Review Posted Online: June 14, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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