Greaney could dial back the bloodletting a notch and still have an exciting story.
Futuristic robots take center stage in the Gray Man’s latest bloody adventure.
Courtland “the Gray Man” Gentry and Zoya Zakharova are lovers trying to enjoy a peaceful hideaway by Guatemala’s beautiful Lake Atitlán when a tiny drone with facial recognition capabilities tracks them down. A worldwide manhunt is underway for them, and Russia has a capture-or-kill order out on Zoya. For those just tuning in to the series, by the way, the twosome used to be mortal enemies. Now one of the planet’s most infamous killers for hire is after them, an evildoer named Scott Kincaid, aka Lancer. But on to the main plot: Multibillionaire Anton Hinton is building a lethal autonomous weapon driven by artificial intelligence. Strangely, over a 34-hour period, 10 people involved in AI and robotics have been murdered around the world. Hinton insists he’s just trying to bring some sanity into the world: With these machines engaging in any necessary fighting and doing so with perfect judgment, human wars could become a thing of the past. Wait a sec, just looking for the perfect cliche. Oh yes: What could possibly go wrong? Greaney, a terrific action writer, has jumped the shark (oops, another cliche; it won’t happen again, sorry) with a science fiction setup involving bomb-wielding hexacopters, rifle-wielding robot dogs, and a superintelligent creature named Cyrus who’s controlled by 800 IBM mainframe computers. So who will get control of this technology? China, maybe. Or, as series regular Zack Hightower says as he wipes his bloody nose, “America…. Fuck, yeah.” In a scene emblematic of the story’s chaos, Zoya lies in a dead man’s blood as the man’s left leg is hit, “and it snapped and shattered the bone there, bits of meat spraying in all directions.” And, in a contemplative moment with Zoya, Court says he just wants to be with her in peace, while he wonders if he’d “ever be able to stop killing motherfuckers who deserved to die.” Indeed, violence is the point of his life.
Greaney could dial back the bloodletting a notch and still have an exciting story.Pub Date: Feb. 20, 2024
ISBN: 9780593548141
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2023
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
This mystery’s promising premise bogs down in an overloaded cast.
When one woman takes on another’s identity to uncover a crime, they both become suspects in a murder.
Aubrey Price and Camille Bayliss come from different worlds, only crossing paths because of the discovery that Camille’s husband, powerful lawyer Ben Bayliss, is hiding something terrible that affects them both. As the novel opens, Aubrey is driving Camille’s Range Rover, then teetering into a bar on Camille’s high heels, with Camille’s dress and credit cards and a wig that mimics Camille’s hair, pretending to be her because Ben tracks his wife’s every move and expenditure, and Camille wants to create a smokescreen while she sneaks into his office in search of evidence of that unnamed secret. But the scheme goes awry, and the women become each other’s alibis after Camille finds Ben murdered in their home. The first part of the book builds suspense and misdirection well, with Aubrey and Ben’s straight-arrow partner, Hank Landry, serving as first-person observers in some chapters while others track Camille. She’s a wealthy and privileged woman but not a happy one, stuck under the thumbs of her husband and her tyrannical father, Randall Everett, who pretty much runs their small Louisiana town. Aubrey was orphaned as a teen when her parents died in a car crash and has proudly fended for herself ever since, coming to depend on her four roommates, who have become friends. But as the cast of characters grows, it seems as if almost everyone in town has a motive for killing Ben, and the piling up of suspects and movements among different timelines can sometimes be confusing. And it all comes to a frustrating end when, after a whole school of red herrings, the solution to Ben’s murder arrives out of far left field.
This mystery’s promising premise bogs down in an overloaded cast.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9780593834459
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
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