An enjoyable thriller that should make readers wonder what other parts of Italy the author could creatively mine.
A debut novel examines how a determined individual can use religious tenets to disguise political ambitions.
In this story set in Rome in the near future, the man who must uncover and unravel the Mithras conspiracy is Commissario Marco Leone “of the Polizia di Stato,” one of Italy’s national police forces. Leone must solve the gruesome murder of his childhood friend, a priest attached to the Vatican Library. The priest’s sister, Leone’s former lover, hints that his murder may have something to do with a recently discovered parchment that Cardinal Gustavo Furbone wants buried. Little does Leone realize that this quarrel over a document is but one small part of a plot by wealthy Lucio Piso to resurrect the ancient Mithras religion, which Christianity had overtaken, and install himself as ruler of Italy in a coup. Piso hopes to accomplish this by recruiting converts throughout the government and the Vatican, including Leone’s former right-hand man, a highly placed cardinal, and more officials than anyone would expect. Leone, who doesn’t play well with others, slowly pieces together Piso’s scheme on his own as multiple murders and bombings occur, and he becomes the target of several assassination attempts. The action crescendos in a final showdown with Piso. Polelle has put his passion for Italy to good use in this volume. His numerous trips to the country help inform his colorful descriptions of many landmarks. And his intensive research enables him to ably bring the forgotten religion of Mithras to life. The author also deserves credit for populating his work with many flawed characters. Leone may be anti-social and cynical, but at least he’s honest about his motivation: protecting the country he loves from the conspiracy he unearths. Most of the other players, whether religious or secular, have much less admirable goals, seeking to benefit from a Piso regime in some way. Polelle rewards readers with uncertainty in every chapter. Leone’s Rome is a dangerous place, with a masked attacker around virtually every corner. And that’s what makes it fun to visit.
An enjoyable thriller that should make readers wonder what other parts of Italy the author could creatively mine.Pub Date: March 29, 2019
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 313
Publisher: Lido Press
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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