Helms' thriller (The Unresolved Seventh, 2012, etc.) is amiable and stylish but also a bit aimless.
Searching for a precocious teenager in revolution-rocked Cuba is like looking for a needle in a war zone.
Miami crime kingpin Cecil "The Madman" Hacker hires straight-arrow private eye (and hard-boiled narrator) Cormac Loame to retrieve his 14-year-old daughter, Lila, from the clutches of mediocre boxer–turned-bodyguard Danny McCarl, who's wooed the girl and whisked her off to Cuba. Upon his arrival, Loame checks in with Havana police lieutenant Jaime Guzman. Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista's army is being regularly thumped by the rebel forces of Che Guevara and his protege, Fidel Castro, and although it's 1958, the city has the lawless feel of the Wild West. Loame peppers the city with photos of the missing girl, checks in with local petty criminals, and along the way beds a beauty named Élan. Progress in the case takes the form of slow steps. The fatal shooting of a local enforcer named Luis Gopaldo would be a more promising lead if police didn't peg Loame as a suspect. Before he can investigate the Gopaldo murder and clear his name, Loame has a chance encounter on the marina with Havana's most famous civilian, Ernest Hemingway. They talk at length about guns and the case, and Hem gives Loame a revolver and some advice: Get the girl and leave pronto before the country explodes. And so he does, though not before another visit to Hemingway and an encounter with gangster Meyer Lansky.
Helms' thriller (The Unresolved Seventh, 2012, etc.) is amiable and stylish but also a bit aimless.Pub Date: July 17, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4328-2715-1
Page Count: 236
Publisher: Five Star/Gale Cengage
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2013
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.
Too much free time leads a New Hampshire bookseller into yet another case of murder.
Now that Tricia Miles has Pixie Poe and Mr. Everett practically running her bookstore, Haven’t Got a Clue, she finds herself at loose ends. Her wealthy sister, Angelica, who in the guise of Nigela Ricita has invested heavily in making Stoneham a bookish tourist attraction, is entering the amateur competition for the Great Booktown Bake-Off. So Tricia, who’s recently taken up baking as a hobby, decides to join her and spends a lot of time looking for the perfect cupcake recipe. A visit to another bookstore leaves Tricia witnessing a nasty argument between owner Joyce Widman and next-door neighbor Vera Olson over the trimming of tree branches that hang over Joyce’s yard—also overheard by new town police officer Cindy Pearson. After Tricia accepts Joyce’s offer of some produce from her garden, they find Vera skewered by a pitchfork, and when Police Chief Grant Baker arrives, Joyce is his obvious suspect. Ever since Tricia moved to Stoneham, the homicide rate has skyrocketed (Poisoned Pages, 2018, etc.), and her history with Baker is fraught. She’s also become suspicious about the activities at Pets-A-Plenty, the animal shelter where Vera was a dedicated volunteer. Tricia’s offered her expertise to the board, but president Toby Kingston has been less than welcoming. With nothing but baking on her calendar, Tricia has plenty of time to investigate both the murder and her vague suspicions about the shelter. Plenty of small-town friendships and rivalries emerge in her quest for the truth.
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-9848-0272-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
A murder is committed in a stalled transcontinental train in the Balkans, and every passenger has a watertight alibi. But Hercule Poirot finds a way.
**Note: This classic Agatha Christie mystery was originally published in England as Murder on the Orient Express, but in the United States as Murder in the Calais Coach. Kirkus reviewed the book in 1934 under the original US title, but we changed the title in our database to the now recognizable title Murder on the Orient Express. This is the only name now known for the book. The reason the US publisher, Dodd Mead, did not use the UK title in 1934 was to avoid confusion with the 1932 Graham Greene novel, Orient Express.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1934
ISBN: 978-0062073495
Page Count: -
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1934
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