Rose’s take on the thriller formula is spiced up by a touch of melodrama: altogether, a satisfying blend.
Second-novelist Rose (author of the much-publicized, originally self-published Lip Service, 1999) offers a well-crafted study of infidelity, wrapped within the context of a psychothriller.
Thirty-nine-year-old psychotherapist Jordan Sloan has a life of companionable compromise: She lives on the second floor of a brownstone shared with Robert, the husband she separated from five years ago; she begrudgingly accepts her teenaged daughter Lilly’s increasingly obsessive interest in Zen Buddhism and in the boyfriend who spurred it on—all this while trying to put the ghosts of the past to rest, not so easy now that one of those ghosts is being released from prison. At 19, Jordan was secretly dating Dan Mallory, an apprentice at her father’s jewelry store. When Mallory was fired (because of the relationship), he returned to the shop, gun in hand, and murdered Jordan’s father right before her eyes. Now that he’s about to be freed, Jordan, with good reason, fears that Mallory may be after her: she’s had a string of ominous phone calls, and thinks that that someone might be following her. Meanwhile, Lilly, a budding photographer following in her famous father’s footsteps, has captured the same shadowy figure in the background of a series of photos. Unfortunately, no one believes Jordan: her D.A. brother assures her that Mallory was a model prisoner; and her daughter chastises her for being so suspicious and spreading negative energy. Within this context, the author introduces the questions of adultery and forgiveness. Robert’s unfaithfulness was the sole reason for their separation, and now Jordan is ready to finalize the divorce, even though the love between the two is evident and Robert is seeking reconciliation. But can Jordan trust him again? This fast-paced tale climaxes with Robert in a coma from a murder attempt—and Mallory closing in for revenge.
Rose’s take on the thriller formula is spiced up by a touch of melodrama: altogether, a satisfying blend.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-7434-0645-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Pocket
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2000
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IN THE NEWS
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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