In his fourth literary tour of duty, submariner Michael (Patch) Pacino (now a two-star admiral) matches wits and superweapons with Japan's underseas forces: a stunningly effective technopolitical thriller from DiMercurio (Phoenix Sub Zero, 1994, etc.) In the near postmillennial future, an impoverished but well- armed Japan (which has been shut out of consumer markets worldwide due to unfair trade practices) is panicked into a preemptive strike against Manchuria, a new state that emerged following the breakup of mainland China and the USSR. The sneak attack angers America, which (under the leadership of its first woman president) decides to deny the home islands access to the foreign oil and raw materials that sustain them. Tokyo soon dispatches a squadron of computer-controlled U-boats to deal with the blockade. American Navy subs sink these unmanned craft, though not before they send almost all of the US surface ships, including an aircraft carrier, to the bottom. The shocking losses mean that Patch and his overmatched flotilla are the only American forces left in the Pacific to maintain the commercial quarantine. Facing a tight deadline from the chief executive, who plans to seek a negotiated end to the undeclared war if there aren't immediate results against Japan's crew-run subs, the gutsy admiral calls in Piranha, a new attack vessel equipped with Vortex torpedoes (state-of-the-art missiles that vaporize their targets). Until Piranha reaches the operations area, however, Pacino must hold his own against superior foes from an underwater command post aboard the Barracuda. In a series of close, hair-raising encounters beneath the waves offshore Japan, Patch's deep-sea sailors turn the tide of battle, saving East and West from a particularly unfortunate repeat of military history. A dandy hell-and-high-water yarn, with characters of some complexity and depth, a plausible scenario for global calamity, and an author who knows his way around the silent service's advanced technology.
Pub Date: Feb. 20, 1996
ISBN: 1-55611-458-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Donald Fine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1995
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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