Action junkies will love this one.
The eighth danger-dripping crime thriller featuring Peter Ash.
One bitterly cold Wisconsin winter, Marine combat vet Peter Ash and his tight friend Lewis pay a visit to Teddy “Upstate” Wilson, a one-eyed ex-con, only to find him shivering in the snow while his cabin burns to the ground. Attackers have shot his dogs and stolen his notebooks, which are key to the story. As part of his therapy after having been shot in the head, Teddy has been writing down everything he can remember, from bowel movements to sex with his speech pathologist to the many crimes he’s committed—including dates, locations, and the names of everyone involved. Those latter details could get a lot of folks, Lewis included, offed or imprisoned. Series fans already know that Lewis occasionally heads an elusive group that robs and often kills upper-level bad guys. Said group is an underworld legend often called the Ghost Killers, and even law enforcement is unsure whether the group is more than a myth. Lewis has a strong moral code: “You only go after people the law can’t get,” and you never shoot anybody who has his hands up. Teddy is a bit simple, due in part to his brain injury. Before his attack, Teddy had even stopped slapping mosquitoes, but his character arc takes him far from that gentle self. Peter and Lewis, on the other hand, don’t change dramatically from story to story. Both have strong loyalty to family and to each other and are brave, smart, and deadly in a fight. Here the mortal enemy is an ex-CIA dude named Jay Streyling, a stereotypical killer lacking in redeeming qualities. Above him is a fearsome boss whose personal grief fuels an enduring over-the-top rage. On the good-guy side of the ledger, Peter and Lewis have June and Dinah, respectively, in their lives. They’re strong, take-no-crap women determined that their men—their families—stay alive. For sheer entertainment value, though, there’s no beating Teddy Wilson. All he wants is his set of notebooks and permission to fire tranquilizer darts. Oh, and maybe to hang someone by his ankles outside a 23rd-floor window.
Action junkies will love this one.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9780593540558
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.
Character assassination reigns supreme, if not uncontested, in a Long Island suburb.
April Masterson loves her husband, corporate attorney Elliott; their 7-year-old, Bobby; and her YouTube channel, “April’s Sweet Secrets.” What she doesn’t love is whoever’s texting her warnings about how Bobby isn’t really in their backyard while she’s busy filming her videos or withering critiques of her baking show or veiled accusations about her past and threats about her present. Her best friend, former prosecutor Julie Bressler, may be bossy and opinionated, but surely she’d never turn on April this way. Who else might know enough to send April goodies like a picture of her kissing Mark Tanner, Bobby’s soccer coach? Though April struggles to get Elliot to take her ordeal seriously, even when she shows up at his office for a lunch date, he’s protected by his receptionist, Brianna Anderson, whose attachment to her boss goes far beyond loyalty. Then Julie turns on her; Maria Cooper, her friendly new next-door neighbor, turns on her; and in the most mind-boggling scene, Doris Kirkland, April’s mother, whose dementia has brought her to a nursing home, turns on her. McFadden releases an escalating series of toxins so deftly into the suburban atmosphere that it’s practically an anticlimax when someone gets killed and April instantly becomes the prime suspect. But that’s only a setup for the tale’s boldest move: switching its narrator from April to a fair-weather friend who frames the whole nightmare in dramatically different terms. As a special gift to her savviest fans, the author throws in an even more jolting epilogue that’s as hard to forget as it is to believe.
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249600
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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