An impressive, creepy tale that may make some online daters cautious.
Two Portland, Oregon, teens investigate their loved ones’ inexplicably strange behavior and soon find themselves in danger in Field’s (Nocturnal, 2015, etc.) thriller.
When Karl Morgan’s older sister, Stacey, shows up late for work the morning after her date with ophthalmologist Adam Reynolds, she doesn’t seem to be herself. She ignores her beloved cat, too, and also candidly tells Karl about her sexual escapades. As the days go on, Stacey only gets worse, becoming more erratic and even violent with their mother on Christmas Day. Convinced that his sister is repressing some kind of trauma (possibly a date rape), Karl looks for answers, starting with Adam, whom Stacey had met on an online dating site. Seventeen-year-old Dawn Flint, meanwhile, is in a similar predicament; her mother, Isobel, connects with a woman named Maxine via the internet and, post-date, is acting very different. Specifically, she unnerves Dawn with her shifting facial expressions, which show apparent terror one second and a complete lack of emotion the next. As the teen tracks down Maxine’s previous hookups, Karl enlists the aid of a private investigator. Later, he spots a mysterious, gray-haired man whom Stacey had mentioned during hypnotherapy. Karl and Dawn eventually team up but soon confront something that’s much bigger and more horrifying than they anticipated. Field’s somber tale thrives on keeping readers largely in the dark, especially regarding exactly what happened to Stacey and Isobel. There are, however, enough hints and speculations to provide readers with a thoroughly unnerving experience. Adam, for example, sports a perpetual grin that won’t go away—even as Karl punches him in the face. A haunting dread surrounds the story and its main characters, who don’t know who all the bad guys are or even how many there are. The pace is relentless, with very few moments of humor or relief. Although the bloody and unforgettable final act offers resolution, Field shrewdly keeps some ambiguity alive, and the closing line of dialogue will surely give readers jitters.
An impressive, creepy tale that may make some online daters cautious.Pub Date: June 9, 2016
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 418
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 15, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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