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THE LAST WEAPON

Fun and frantic, with ample scientific backing.

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In McCluskey’s ((Physics and Astronomy/Washington State University; Dopants and Defects in Semiconductors, 2012) debut novel, a levelheaded professor and a corrupt business tycoon go head-to-head over a “failed” experiment, which, in fact, has the potential to destroy the world.

Mike Harris is a member of the physics department of small, newly established Colton University. Its founder, Henry Colton, is a lover of science but also a man involved in many lucrative projects, with his life goal of being the world’s first trillionaire. Mike, meanwhile, is living the life of a run-of-the-mill, middle-aged academic, conducting research, getting over heartbreak, living life as a single man in a college town. With his colleagues at the university, he completed an experiment intended to synthesize a black hole. But the results seemed weak, so Mike considered his findings inadequate. As a young writer arrives to conduct an interview on their research, an explosion sets fire to the lab, killing several members of the department. It isn’t until his ex-fiancee is murdered that Mike is suspected as an armed and dangerous criminal and consequently blamed for the incident at the lab. Apparently, his blunder of an experiment held true value, and now Colton and his associates want to harness its destructive power for use as a catalyst in starting a rejuvenated society. The novel spans 10 days: On Day One, the researchers can’t fathom the magnitude of their findings, but in a final showdown, Earth’s existence rests on Mike’s and his team’s shoulders. The action-packed book is rather dense, with numerous characters turning on each other in one chapter and then re-establishing trust in the next. Heavy on back-and-forth dialogue, the narrative features little back story on its characters, so even with frequent catastrophic events, there’s not much of an emotion pull. Still, McCluskley’s scientific background comes through in his passionate yet objective writing style and his skillful treatment of physics as a whole.

Fun and frantic, with ample scientific backing.

Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2013

ISBN: 978-0615823225

Page Count: 448

Publisher: Confocal Media, Inc.

Review Posted Online: March 3, 2014

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MAGIC HOUR

Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.

Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.

Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.

Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.

Pub Date: March 1, 2006

ISBN: 0-345-46752-3

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005

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THE CATCHER IN THE RYE

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

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