A favorable introduction to a sci-fi series that sets the stage for more action-packed adventures.
Debut author Rich’s sci-fi novel sends its characters on a roller-coaster journey through time.
It’s the end of the 21st century, and the human race is facing its greatest threat yet. Although incredible advances in technology and society have solved many problems, thousands are dying of Metagenesis, a condition in which a person’s soul separates from their body after too many reincarnation cycles. After Grace Dartmouth learns that her son, Jordan, has contracted the terrible disease, she’s determined to do anything to save him. Her chance comes when the world’s leading Metagenesis specialist approaches her and her soon-to-be-ex-husband, Marc Dartmouth, about an unapproved clinical trial. Dr. Messie describes how Jordan’s soul could be repaired by cloning a compatible soul from a past life—in this case, one of Marc’s. Grace is the only person who could possibly recognize Marc’s soul, so she’s chosen to travel back to the year 2000 and find it. She and her companion, Kay, arrive in the Las Vegas of that era, where they must navigate confusing customs as they race to accomplish their mission. After Grace discovers some sinister omissions in Messie’s story, she’s forced to make a painful decision—with her son’s life hanging in the balance. Rich spins an ambitious and imaginative concept into a plot that’s full of fantastically complicated twists. Throughout, readers receive myriad details about the mechanics of the fictional world and the motivations of its characters. Throughout, the narrative raises and resolves questions at a brisk pace, making for a compelling page-turner. The author occasionally oversaturates the narrative with excessive description or heavy-handed explanation, but the engaging plot and likable characters make up for these flaws. Grace and Marc’s dynamic as they navigate their broken relationship and their son’s illness is especially well-rendered. Rich wraps things up with a cohesive, satisfying ending, leaving plenty of intrigue for a promised sequel.
A favorable introduction to a sci-fi series that sets the stage for more action-packed adventures.Pub Date: Aug. 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-947072-92-3
Page Count: 344
Publisher: Words Matter Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 20, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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