The rich are different from you and me, DeMille instructs in this lightweight entertainment, where nearly every element can...
More good-natured tough-guy fiction from regular-as-clockwork novelist DeMille (Wild Fire, 2006, etc.).
When readers left lawyer and freelance gumshoe John Sutter at the end of The Gold Coast (1990), he was a most unhappy man: His wife had been, well, dallying with the Mafia don who had hired him to sort out his taxes, something had gone amiss in the relationship and said wife had filled said don with lead. In the intervening years, it seems, Sutter has sailed around the world with an eye to finding paradise and staying far away from the Long Island shore, winding up in London advising British barristers that “screwing the Internal Revenue Service was an American tradition.” Post 9/11, some thought of Americanness has drawn him back, and, this being a postmodern era, he has returned to living on the Gold Coast in the estate of his ex, the ever-luscious Susan Stanhope Sutter, who somehow has escaped the justice that would be meted out to us poor folk and instead is having her nails done at liberty. But then life gets complicated, as it does: The don’s son and heir, a toughie named Anthony Bellarosa, insinuates himself into Sutter’s life to get at Susan, who, meanwhile, has been visiting Sutter in the gate house at all hours and in all states of dress and undress. The characters are just shy of stock. It’s not just that they have more money, but that they really do live like the characters in The Great Gatsby, save here with more guns and considerably more intricate plots involving one another.
The rich are different from you and me, DeMille instructs in this lightweight entertainment, where nearly every element can be seen coming from a long way off.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-446-53342-3
Page Count: 670
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2008
Brown’s ear for Texas dialect and her earnest characterizations of cynical lawmen with stout hearts make for an enjoyable...
A manhunt for a homicidal stalker reunites an ex-cop and his long-lost daughter, in Brown’s latest thriller (Rainwater, 2009).
Private eye Dodge Hanley, who left the Houston police for Atlanta years before, is summoned back to Texas by his long-ago flame Caroline King, now a successful realtor. Caroline wants Dodge, who once rescued her from an abusive fiancé, to lend his sleuthing skills to find Oren Starks, the man who burst in on her daughter Berry and Berry’s co-worker Ben at Caroline’s lake house near the small town of Merritt. Shooting and wounding Ben, Oren fled, but not before vowing to murder Berry. A dismissed co-worker at the Houston marketing firm where Berry and Ben work, Oren was unhinged by his thwarted efforts to woo Berry and another colleague, Sally Buckland. Dodge (who, unbeknownst to Berry, is her father) and local deputy Ski Nyland join forces to track Oren down. Ski’s call to Sally finds her strangely reluctant to corroborate her previous claim of sexual harassment against Oren, perhaps because Oren has a gun to her head during the call. Despite a leg injury sustained at Caroline’s house, Oren confounds pursuers by somehow managing to be in several places at once. He breaks into a Merritt motel room, fatally wounding a teenager who surprises him there. Sally’s body is found hanging in the closet of Berry’s Houston home. Oren takes an elderly couple hostage in a campground, and kills again before disappearing into the Big Thicket, a treacherous, swampy national park. Brown’s trademark romance spiced with raunch serves her well as she orchestrates two parallel lust stories: Caroline’s and Dodge’s passionate but brief encounter in 1978, and the present frisson between Berry and Dodge’s younger doppelgänger, hard-boiled cop Ski. The narrative, slowed by too many talky scenes and descriptive filler, eventually rewards readers’ patience with a bang-up surprise ending.
Brown’s ear for Texas dialect and her earnest characterizations of cynical lawmen with stout hearts make for an enjoyable summer read.Pub Date: Aug. 12, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4165-6310-5
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2010
A romantic suspense that skillfully balances both elements.
A successful businesswoman hires a smooth-talking bounty hunter to find a lead on her sister’s murder.
Kate Gallagher was the only one available to identify her younger sister Chrissy’s body after she was found dead, having run away from home two years earlier. Since Chrissy succumbed to drugs and turned to sex work to survive, her murder isn't taken seriously by the local homicide department. Kate is filled with grief and regret at not having been there for her sister, and she’s determined to find her killer as a kind of penance. Jason Maddox is the charming man Kate almost hooked up with at a local bar. He also happens to be on the payroll of the most successful investigation company in Dallas. He’s all too eager to help Kate out and spend more time getting to know the blonde he danced with at the Sagebrush Saloon. At first, Kate and Jason vow to keep things professional until the case is solved; there’s obvious attraction that they’re willing to pursue at a later date. But the increasing sense of danger mixed with Kate and Jason’s close proximity proves to be too heady of a combination. The tension never lets up as the pair visit seedy bars and interrogate unsavory characters. With a steamy romance and undeniably hot chemistry, the main characters are well matched. They’re both driven, slightly stubborn, and enjoy the adrenaline rush of catching criminals. Martin (The Conspiracy, 2019, etc.) doesn’t skimp on graphic, violent details as Chrissy’s murder leads her couple to something much bigger: human trafficking. Though not for the faint of heart given its weighty material, this is an un-put-down-able page-turner that’s sure to satisfy fans of romance and thrillers alike.
A romantic suspense that skillfully balances both elements.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-335-00769-8
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Harlequin HQN
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2019
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