by Morgan Fleetwood ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 24, 2017
A bleak and disquieting but extraordinary character study.
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Fleetwood’s debut thriller details a murderer’s painstakingly detailed confession, written for an inspector who ultimately crosses his path.
Thirty-two-year-old Alex Melville moved from America to Europe as a child and is currently living in Sicily, working as a freelance translator. He first sees Valentina outside a café and follows her before introducing himself. She has physical traits that appeal to him—her face, her hair, her beautiful skin—and he buys her lavish gifts, starting with expensive chocolates. He convinces her to come to his Catania home, where he attempts to imprison her as part of a plan that isn’t immediately revealed. Unforeseen events, however, thwart his intentions, and he winds up on the run from authorities. In need of a place to hide, Alex looks for his missing younger sister, Sonia. Her problems with cocaine have attached her to a thuggish boyfriend, Carlo Riccio, who, unsurprisingly, doesn’t provide Alex much help in finding her. Alex’s search takes him to his old home in Luxembourg, where he meets an initially unnamed inspector. This novel takes the form of a first-person confession that Alex is recording for this new acquaintance. Fate has put the two of them together, and a violent conclusion to their association seems inescapable. Fleetwood’s gloomy tale is split into three parts: Alex’s attempts to ensnare Valentina; his time as a fugitive; and the twisty final act with the inspector. All three are equally riveting as they relay the exploits of the deeply disturbed narrator. It’s evident that Alex has a sinister agenda, even when his specific intentions are shadowy—although readers will likely guess them. His narration eerily blends the grotesque with the beautiful: at one point, he equates a blade with a flute, musing, “Oh, the music it could play. The melodies of the flesh.” Most impressively, the author gradually offers different perspectives on Alex: Carlo and his minions are brutal, practically turning Alex into a victim, and the third part of the novel may even generate a modicum of reader sympathy for him. The appropriately dark conclusion has a particularly stark finality.
A bleak and disquieting but extraordinary character study.Pub Date: June 24, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5215-8602-0
Page Count: 293
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Dec. 27, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by J.D. Salinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 1951
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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by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2006
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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