Not an entirely successful mission, but one that may interest avid armchair warriors.
A fierce battle between Iranian mujahideen fighters and a U.S. military convoy sets the stage for Williams’ debut conspiracy thriller.
Steve Holmes is a former FBI agent and current executive for Kratos, a U.S. Department of Defense contractor named after the winged enforcer for the Greek god Zeus. After a firefight in Iran results in the deaths of 35 American soldiers on his watch, Holmes has questions: Where was the intel? Why didn’t they receive communications from anyone outside the convoy? He knows three things. First: “Our people died for no good reason today.” Second: “Something or someone caused that FUBAR mess.” And third: “I’ll find out who or what…if it’s the last thing I do.” Holmes’ investigation soon puts him at odds with his abusive, ethically challenged boss, who directs him to forge relationships with unreliable Middle Eastern partners, saying that “We can make billions.” But his main nemesis is Alex Shankle, a pro-war U.S. senator with an increasingly suspect agenda. Holmes finds an ally in FBI Special Agent Sherry Adkison, who’s every bit as stalwart as he is. They make a solid team, keeping their heads in a conspiracy plot that becomes increasingly unhinged. Williams, who has extensive experience working for military contractors, is on more solid ground writing about that industry’s workings. His profound respect for members of the military is palpable, as is his frustration with a system that sometimes fails to honor their hard work and sacrifice. At one point, for instance, he points out that injured and deceased contractors are denied the Purple Heart. A couple of key character arcs are anticlimactic, though, and Williams sometimes includes odd, gratuitous details (such as that Sen. Shankle enjoys “pancakes with real maple syrup and smoked sausage” during a meeting with his colleagues). The dialogue also tends toward B movie clichés (“The whole world will call me ‘Mr. President’ one day”).
Not an entirely successful mission, but one that may interest avid armchair warriors.Pub Date: May 24, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-692-42220-5
Page Count: 344
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Feb. 7, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s...
The traumatic homecoming of a wounded warrior.
The daughter of alcoholics who left her orphaned at 17, Jolene “Jo” Zarkades found her first stable family in the military: She’s served over two decades, first in the army, later with the National Guard. A helicopter pilot stationed near Seattle, Jo copes as competently at home, raising two daughters, Betsy and Lulu, while trying to dismiss her husband Michael’s increasing emotional distance. Jo’s mettle is sorely tested when Michael informs her flatly that he no longer loves her. Four-year-old Lulu clamors for attention while preteen Betsy, mean-girl-in-training, dismisses as dweeby her former best friend, Seth, son of Jo’s confidante and fellow pilot, Tami. Amid these challenges comes the ultimate one: Jo and Tami are deployed to Iraq. Michael, with the help of his mother, has to take over the household duties, and he rapidly learns that parenting is much harder than his wife made it look. As Michael prepares to defend a PTSD-afflicted veteran charged with Murder I for killing his wife during a dissociative blackout, he begins to understand what Jolene is facing and to revisit his true feelings for her. When her helicopter is shot down under insurgent fire, Jo rescues Tami from the wreck, but a young crewman is killed. Tami remains in a coma and Jo, whose leg has been amputated, returns home to a difficult rehabilitation on several fronts. Her nightmares in which she relives the crash and other horrors she witnessed, and her pain, have turned Jo into a person her daughters now fear (which in the case of bratty Betsy may not be such a bad thing). Jo can't forgive Michael for his rash words. Worse, she is beginning to remind Michael more and more of his homicide client. Characterization can be cursory: Michael’s earlier callousness, left largely unexplained, undercuts the pathos of his later change of heart.
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s aftermath.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-312-57720-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
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