A modest style of writing paves the way for bold characters and a swift narrative cadence.
The apparent murder of a recovering alcoholic leads police to suspect the dead man’s Alcoholics Anonymous sponsee.
Harmon Hesse is found dead with his wrists slit, an apparent suicide, but detectives think someone may have done the cutting for him. Fellow AA-attendee Daniel McBride is the cops’ top suspect. Harmon had been Daniel’s sponsor in the recovery program, but their relationship soured. A confrontation between the two was witnessed; Daniel believed that Harmon had killed his dog. But the icing on the cake? Some of Harmon’s blood is found in Daniel’s car. The police arrest Daniel, who has a mountain of evidence stacked against him. Jensen’s book opens in full throttle—by page three, someone’s been accused of murder. The novel then focuses on the repercussions of the murder and ensuing investigation rather than on the actual investigation. Detective Carmen Sanchez spends more time dating Daniel’s houseguest, Ben, than gathering information. Daniel’s wife, Helen, seems solely concerned about the case’s affect on her run for mayor. And attorney Albert Ramirez has no interest in proving Daniel’s innocence. Jensen lets the pages smolder with secrets—Helen’s possibly having an affair; Lenny, Daniel’s best friend and business partner, is clearly hiding something; and the mysterious witness prepped to testify for the DA doesn’t seem to be motivated by the prospect of serving justice. The author’s prose is simple in its narration, which keeps the plot and pages turning. He also throws in a number of standout scenes, including Daniel’s interrogation, where the man—sans a lawyer—holds a policeman’s gaze, coolly smokes a cigarette and answers not a single question. The final chapter is little more than a wrap-up.
A modest style of writing paves the way for bold characters and a swift narrative cadence.Pub Date: July 5, 2012
ISBN: 978-1475175486
Page Count: 368
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A satisfying thriller that will warm the hearts of fans who already take comfort in hating the forces of evil.
Lt. Eve Dallas’ 63rd futuristic case is less a whodunit than a manhunt for an unusually sympathetic killer.
Thirteen years ago, way back in 2048, scientific genius Steve Redman—father of the Banner-Wyst corporation’s Rainmaker Project—narrowly escaped death in a gas explosion that killed his pregnant wife and infant son and 200 other residents of their New York City apartment building the night before he planned to report his suspicions about the company to the FBI. Now the bill is coming due for Banner-Wyst. The first death to be discovered is that of Lawrence Chu, Redman’s colleague and trusted friend, whose tenure as director of bioengineering science ends when he’s beaten to death. For quite a while, Dallas and her partner, Det. Delia Peabody, know less about this mystery than their readers do. But when Ezra Dent, a consultant to Banner-Wyst who worked with Redman and Chu back in the day, is murdered in exactly the same ferocious way, Dallas and Peabody, with help from Roarke, Dallas’ tech-billionaire husband, promptly put the pieces together and determine who they’re looking for. The search for Redman, who went AWOL from his hospital bed without a trace six years ago, has its own challenges. So does Dallas’ attempt to get cooperation from partners Calvin Banner and Jacob Wyst, who are clearly in the crosshairs of a killer who seems a lot less monstrous than they are. If the breaks in the case are suspiciously convenient in arriving, readers can pride themselves on taking sides against a mega-corporation whose self-avowed ecological saintliness is undermined by its leaders’ underhanded dealing.
A satisfying thriller that will warm the hearts of fans who already take comfort in hating the forces of evil.Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2026
ISBN: 9781250414564
Page Count: 368
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2026
The delightful debut of a classic, prolific detective.
It takes a quirky sleuth to solve a baffling closed-door murder.
The author himself or, more accurately, some version of him, walks the reader through a “gruesome murder” that occurred in a rural farming village. At the center of the crime is the wealthy Ichiyanagi family, including the widow Itoko and her five children. The “heinous crime” occurs in the evening after the festive wedding of eldest son Kenzo to schoolteacher Katsuko. Yokomizo, part narrator and part raconteur, liberally shares digressions such as the fact that his favorite British author is A.A. Milne, who wrote The Red House Mystery as well as the books about Winnie-the-Pooh. Written in 1946 but set in 1937 before the devastation of World War II, this is the first novel featuring Kosuke Kindaichi, the legendary detective who appeared in more than 70 stories by Yokomizo. If Yokomizo is the Japanese Agatha Christie, Kindaichi may seem the Japanese Hercule Poirot—although actually, given his unkempt hair and apparently distracted manner, he’s more a cross between Poirot and Columbo. Shrewdly, his entrance is delayed until midway through the novel, after the police have stalled and both the family and the reader are anxious for a solution. The narrator’s garrulous charm, in a mystery long on logistics and forensic clues but short on detailed character portraits or extended interactions, is a key to the novel’s success, leavening the more intricate pieces of the puzzle. Armchair detectives will welcome the helpful character list that precedes the story.
The delightful debut of a classic, prolific detective.Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2026
ISBN: 9781805336549
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Pushkin Vertigo
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2026
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