An enthralling and unnerving probe into the complex mind of a murderer.
In this thriller, a desperate author agrees to write the story of an enigmatic, self-professed serial killer.
Rick Philips’ days of being a famous author may be behind him. It’s been more than a decade since he released the bestselling Shelter in Place, in which he recounts his experience as the sole survivor of a high school shooting. He now teaches writing at Dupont University. But the college’s dean implies that if Rick doesn’t soon produce something substantial, he’ll lose his job. As it happens, Rick has already found a topic for his next book: a female serial killer. Or rather, she found him. He and Harriet Bristol Wheeler met recently at a writers’ conference, where she admitted she is a serial murderer and told him she wants him to tell her story. He complies and begins regularly interviewing Harriet. She says she’s killed 12 individuals but insists they aren’t victims, as they were all “bad people.” To allay any doubts Rick may have, Harriet takes him to a dumped body that she later IDs. Beyond that, she’s predominantly evasive: She reveals her history but only gradually names the others she’s murdered. Rick doesn’t immediately see the danger in his frequent proximity to a serial killer, but his life has been in turmoil for years, as he drinks excessively and has nightmares of Ian Maynard Abbot, the school shooter who nearly killed him. It may not be long before Harriet, who’s both clever and unpredictable, becomes the “monster” Rick fears the most. Peters’ (The Complete Collection of Short Stories, 2019, etc.) evenly paced novel is a riveting look at a serial killer, even if only in glimpses. Despite Harriet’s openness in detailing certain murders, she’s shrouded in mystery. Harriet isn’t her real name, and she cryptically tells Rick that, while she’s killed some, others have “just happened to die around” her. Rick also has a somewhat murky background. But this slowly comes to light through interactions with two strong female characters: Paige Turner, his first ex-wife, with whom he’s still on good terms; and Samantha Taylor, a neighbor, Dupont graduate student, and potential love interest. Though Rick and Harriet often assert that she’s a cunning murderer who doesn’t fit serial killer profiles, it’s not clear how she’s eluded detection for so long. For example, most scenes show Harriet killing someone with little to no planning and no indication she took precautions to avoid leaving evidence behind. Still, Harriet is an endlessly intriguing character. Rick sometimes sees “coldness” in her eyes or lack of emotion, but she easily charms people. What she’s thinking or feeling is nearly impossible to determine, and readers may wonder how much of what she’s relaying to Rick is true. The author generates a modicum of sympathy for Harriet, who supposedly has an inoperable brain lesion and a daughter whom someone took from her. Rick, meanwhile, makes a disturbing request of Harriet, which plays out in a twisty final act and open ending.
An enthralling and unnerving probe into the complex mind of a murderer.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-73308-831-2
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Time Tunnel Media
Review Posted Online: Aug. 14, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
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