Crais spikes this predictable, foolproof yarn with so many surprises and such a masterly command of pace that you’ll find...
After eight entertainingly laid-back mysteries starring Elvis Cole (L.A. Requiem, 1999, etc.), Crais tightens the screws to the max in this white-hot crossover thriller about a cop on the trail of a serial bomber.
Three years ago, Carol Starkey was abruptly retired from the LAPD’s Bomb Squad by an explosive that killed both her and her supervisor/lover. She was brought back to life after two minutes of flatlining; he wasn’t. Now that she’s working at Criminal Conspiracy, she’s the obvious choice to head the investigation when a bomb kills her old colleague Charlie Riggio. And even though her own ordeal left her dead in more ways than one, she’s a terrific choice, too, because right from the start she makes things happen. She realizes that the bomb must have been detonated by remote control, and that the killer must therefore have been on the scene. When ATF agent Jack Pell links the murder to half a dozen earlier bombings-for-hire and assassinations of explosives experts, she joins forces with Pell in an uneasy romance that keeps the case in the LAPD corral. And, inevitably, she finds herself online with Mr. Red, the gleefully self-advertising bomber obsessed with making the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list (and evidently imitating his fictional model Hannibal Lecter). But not all Starkey’s calls turn out golden, and one of them sparks a shocking plot twist that brings the globe-hopping Mr. Red, who’d been perfectly happy killing people in faraway jurisdictions, back to the City of Angels. Soon enough, Starkey’s been frozen out of the case, forced to go up against Mr. Red with only Pell for backup.
Crais spikes this predictable, foolproof yarn with so many surprises and such a masterly command of pace that you’ll find yourself checking the clock every ten pages. Make sure it’s not digital.Pub Date: April 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-385-49584-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2000
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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