Thoroughly engrossing, both the investigators and their investigations.
An uncle-nephew private eye team takes on dual cases involving the rape of a 17-year-old girl and a probable murder in this second volume of a mystery series.
The newest client for Dallas private investigators Jack Crocker and his sister’s ex-Marine son, Jimmy McGuire, is Ben Rogers, insurance company CFO. Ben wants to hire the gumshoes to find the McMillan University students who raped his teen daughter, Robyn, at a campus party. Cops and campus security have been no help, and Robyn, scared and withdrawn, offers scarce details on her assailants. Moreover, someone’s taunting her by sending videos and photos of her attack that disappear seconds later. Before they can make headway, Jack and Jimmy catch another case: Pastor J.D. Finley’s convinced his brotherly cousin Jackson Parks’ death wasn’t an accidental overdose or suicide, but murder instead. Oddly enough, an assistant district attorney who’s also died mysteriously was second chair for a decades-old murder trial on which Jackson was the sole black juror. And just out of prison is the man wrongfully convicted of said crime, perhaps craving retribution. The detectives alternate between the cases, determined to stop the rapists from hurting anyone else, as well as someone on a potential killing spree. Langer (Hide & Seek, 2014, etc.) deftly weaves the two cases, with Jack and Jimmy moving between them with interrogations, research, and stakeouts. The story wisely focuses a bit more on Robyn’s assault, with ample coverage of how the teen and her family are affected. Ben’s rage, for one, may add too much fuel to an already tense situation, and Robyn contemplates seeking no justice as a way to move past her trauma. The teen’s plot alone could have carried the entire thriller, but the risk factor’s boosted considerably with the likelihood of a killer on the loose. Meanwhile, the curious detectives, who live and work together, have contrasting personal lives: Jack tries repairing his relationship with his estranged wife, Crystal, while Jimmy’s hoping for a fresh romance.
Thoroughly engrossing, both the investigators and their investigations.Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-692-81684-4
Page Count: 364
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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