by Nicholas O'Brian ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 19, 2013
An edgy thriller that offends more than it entertains.
This detective-narrated mystery delves deep into a seedy criminal underworld to find out who murdered the saintly leader of a local charity.
Detective Diogenes “Sully” Sullivan is only weeks away from retiring and spending his remaining days drinking Irish whiskey in his room above Rosie’s bar—unless he runs off to Ireland to do the same thing there. His career has been littered with questionable activity and borderline corruption that has had Internal Affairs on his tail for years. However, his career gets its swan song when the body of Carmen Penn is found disguised as a drug-overdosed prostitute. Sully teams up with an enthusiastic new crime lab tech named Lisa to figure out who could have possibly wanted Carmen, the well-respected leader of a local charity, dead. Their journey to find the truth leads them to a strip club, seedy bars, a porn studio and other less-than-respectable establishments filled with a colorful, diverse cast of characters. Author O’Brian’s debut novel would keep readers on the edges of their seats if the narrator didn’t make them want to run for cover. The classic detective of Hammett and Chandler novels was, of course, colored with shades of gray, and he’d sacrifice niceties to solve cases, but here, Sully takes that trope too far with his sexist remarks. He constantly demeans women, as when he talks about Lisa’s curvy figure with vulgar slang, then berates her for swearing, since it’s apparently unbecoming of nice girls. Even worse, the women don’t seem to mind his attitude. Lisa occasionally talks back but mostly accepts his judgments, while a female visitor whom he dines with offers to clean up afterward: “That’s woman’s work,” she says. Readers who can stomach the misogyny might enjoy this pulpy, modern detective story, with its many twists and turns, but it could be rough going for some.
An edgy thriller that offends more than it entertains.Pub Date: July 19, 2013
ISBN: 978-1481823746
Page Count: 186
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by C.J. Box ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 27, 2024
A tale that’s hard to believe but easy to swallow in a single gulp.
A bear is hunting prey in Wyoming’s Bighorns. And not just any bear.
It’s bad enough that Clay Hutmacher, who manages the Double Diamond Ranch, has lost his son, Clay Jr., to a vicious attack by a grizzly bear. What’s much worse is that Clay Jr.—who’d been about to pop the question to game warden Joe Pickett’s daughter, Sheridan—is only the first of the victims over an exceptionally broad geographical area. Marshal Marvin Bertignolli is clawed and bitten to death over in Hanna. Sgt. Ryan Winner is found bleeding out north of Rawlins. Former Twelve Sleep County prosecutor Dulcie Schalk, one of two survivors of an ambush, doesn’t survive her final encounter. The four experts chosen to kill the grizzly rope Joe into their expedition, but since their quarry keeps turning up far from the last sighting, the most meaningful confrontation the Predator Attack Team has is with a pair of Mama Bears, animal rights activists who demand due process for Tisiphone, as they’ve dubbed the presumed killer. Box, who’s far too canny to leave Tisiphone alone on center stage, follows Joe’s old antagonist Dallas Cates as the ex–rodeo star is released from prison and embarks on his revenge tour, which takes him to Lee Ogburn-Russell, an inventor whose life Dallas saved, and Axel Soledad, a correspondent who shares so many enemies with Dallas that he suggests they go after them together. Franchise fans will appreciate new details about Joe’s complicated family, the obligatory high-country landscapes, and yet another corrupt law enforcer.
A tale that’s hard to believe but easy to swallow in a single gulp.Pub Date: Feb. 27, 2024
ISBN: 9780593331347
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
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by Amy Tintera ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 5, 2024
Smart, edgy, and entertaining as heck.
Against her better judgment, Lucy Chase returns to her hometown of Plumpton, Texas, for her grandmother’s birthday, knowing full well that almost everyone in town still believes she murdered her best friend five years ago, when they were in their early 20s.
Coincidentally—or is it?—Ben Owens, a true-crime podcaster, is also in town, interviewing Lucy’s family and former friends about the murder of Savannah Harper, “just the sweetest girl you ever met,” who died from several violent blows to the head. Lucy was found hours later covered in blood, with no memory of what happened. She was—and is—a woman with secrets, which has not endeared her to the people of Plumpton; their narrative is that she was always violent, secretive, difficult. But Ben wants to tell Lucy’s story; attractive and relentless, he uncovers new evidence and coaxes new interviews, and people slowly begin to question whether Lucy is truly guilty. Lucy, meanwhile, lets down her guard, and as she and Ben draw closer together, she has to finally face the truth of her past and unmask the murderer of her complicated, gorgeous, protective friend. Most of the novel is told from Lucy’s point of view, which allows for a natural unspooling of the layers of her life and her story. She’s strong, she’s prickly, and we gradually begin to understand just how wronged she has been. The story is a striking commentary on the insular and harmful nature of small-town prejudice and how women who don’t fit a certain mold are often considered outliers, if not straight-up villains. Tintera is smart to capitalize on how the true-crime podcast boom informs and infuses the current fictional thriller scene; she’s also effective at writing action that transcends the podcast structure.
Smart, edgy, and entertaining as heck.Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 9781250880314
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2024
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