A breezy, soap opera–style story frothed with equal parts jealousy, vengeance, greed, and glamour.
A melodrama features a scorned wife and her dire desire to end up a grieving widow rather than an embittered ex-spouse.
Swiss writer Greco (Angelica’s Discoveries, 2012, etc.) delivers a novel of deceit and comeuppance starring Daisy While, a woman on a mission. The briskly narrated opening chapter finds Daisy dashing through a hospital ward elegantly disguised in an oversized purple hat, carrying a designer purse, and brandishing a perfume bottle filled with poison. Beguiling yet with deadly intentions and “fully loaded with hate,” she heads toward her estranged husband Bernard’s room, where he lies dying. The couple has been estranged for nearly a decade, and Daisy has determined that becoming a widow rather than a divorcée would better suit her high-society reputation, so she’s meticulously plotted her husband’s demise. Not one for surprises, however, Daisy is completely flummoxed upon discovering an unknown woman at Bernard’s bedside. A heated confrontation with the stranger has Daisy on the run. Meanwhile, upon realizing the visitor was his estranged wife, Bernard reflects on his marriage to Daisy, a selfish woman who’d enjoyed a clandestine affair with one of his wealthy business partners. Greco dedicates a good portion of her delightfully devilish book to Daisy and Bernard’s bittersweet back story: he was a rugged, honorable military lieutenant in World War II who’d enjoyed a whirlwind romance with Daisy, a British nanny who grew up poor. Bernard had whisked her away to his Swiss village in 1950, and they promptly married and relocated to England, where he spoiled her and their children. Daisy soon developed a fetish for extravagance, manipulation, and the rush of hunting animals, but it was her indiscretion that cost her Bernard’s love. Meanwhile, Bernard’s old schoolmate Graziella is more than happy to replace her. When Daisy’s plan goes even more awry, she becomes embroiled in another problematic scheme. The author, a clever storyteller, wastes no time with exposition or extraneous dialogue; this is a swift, bracing tale stocked with a minimum of characters. Yet those players are addictive personalities who are well-developed and believable. The initially confusing conclusion is wrapped up as quickly as Daisy and Bernard’s tumultuous situation is presented in the opening pages. But their journey and the heroine’s epiphany make the tale entertaining, enjoyable, and easily devoured in one sitting for fast readers.
A breezy, soap opera–style story frothed with equal parts jealousy, vengeance, greed, and glamour.Pub Date: March 29, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5320-1321-8
Page Count: 162
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: June 13, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.
A tightly wound caseworker is pushed out of his comfort zone when he’s sent to observe a remote orphanage for magical children.
Linus Baker loves rules, which makes him perfectly suited for his job as a midlevel bureaucrat working for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, where he investigates orphanages for children who can do things like make objects float, who have tails or feathers, and even those who are young witches. Linus clings to the notion that his job is about saving children from cruel or dangerous homes, but really he’s a cog in a government machine that treats magical children as second-class citizens. When Extremely Upper Management sends for Linus, he learns that his next assignment is a mission to an island orphanage for especially dangerous kids. He is to stay on the island for a month and write reports for Extremely Upper Management, which warns him to be especially meticulous in his observations. When he reaches the island, he meets extraordinary kids like Talia the gnome, Theodore the wyvern, and Chauncey, an amorphous blob whose parentage is unknown. The proprietor of the orphanage is a strange but charming man named Arthur, who makes it clear to Linus that he will do anything in his power to give his charges a loving home on the island. As Linus spends more time with Arthur and the kids, he starts to question a world that would shun them for being different, and he even develops romantic feelings for Arthur. Lambda Literary Award–winning author Klune (The Art of Breathing, 2019, etc.) has a knack for creating endearing characters, and readers will grow to love Arthur and the orphans alongside Linus. Linus himself is a lovable protagonist despite his prickliness, and Klune aptly handles his evolving feelings and morals. The prose is a touch wooden in places, but fans of quirky fantasy will eat it up.
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21728-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.
A man walks out of a bar and his life becomes a kaleidoscope of altered states in this science-fiction thriller.
Crouch opens on a family in a warm, resonant domestic moment with three well-developed characters. At home in Chicago’s Logan Square, Jason Dessen dices an onion while his wife, Daniela, sips wine and chats on the phone. Their son, Charlie, an appealing 15-year-old, sketches on a pad. Still, an undertone of regret hovers over the couple, a preoccupation with roads not taken, a theme the book will literally explore, in multifarious ways. To start, both Jason and Daniela abandoned careers that might have soared, Jason as a physicist, Daniela as an artist. When Charlie was born, he suffered a major illness. Jason was forced to abandon promising research to teach undergraduates at a small college. Daniela turned from having gallery shows to teaching private art lessons to middle school students. On this bracing October evening, Jason visits a local bar to pay homage to Ryan Holder, a former college roommate who just received a major award for his work in neuroscience, an honor that rankles Jason, who, Ryan says, gave up on his career. Smarting from the comment, Jason suffers “a sucker punch” as he heads home that leaves him “standing on the precipice.” From behind Jason, a man with a “ghost white” face, “red, pursed lips," and "horrifying eyes” points a gun at Jason and forces him to drive an SUV, following preset navigational directions. At their destination, the abductor forces Jason to strip naked, beats him, then leads him into a vast, abandoned power plant. Here, Jason meets men and women who insist they want to help him. Attempting to escape, Jason opens a door that leads him into a series of dark, strange, yet eerily familiar encounters that sometimes strain credibility, especially in the tale's final moments.
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.Pub Date: July 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-90422-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
PROFILES
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