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THE CHAMELEON

A JAKE PALMER NOVEL

An array of engaging characters drives a fast-paced, absorbing terrorist tale.

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In this fourth installment of a thriller series, a former Navy SEAL leads a special ops group in hunting missing nuclear devices that have an unknown target.

Jake Palmer enters Pakistan while other United States personnel flee the country. Pakistani terrorist attacks in India along with a political assassination have pushed the two nations’ tensions to a breaking point. The Pakistan government, meanwhile, has turned a blind eye to terrorist activity. Despite the ongoing turmoil, the Joint Special Operations Command sends Palmer, a skilled investigative consultant, to Islamabad to gather intelligence on Pakistani nuclear weapons. Palmer and his JSOC partner, Alona Green, with whom he’s worked before, keep close eyes on the nukes’ deployment. If war between Pakistan and India erupts with such a devastating arsenal readily available, a “nuclear apocalypse” is a strong, frightening possibility. Quite unexpectedly, three devices seemingly vanish in transport. Palmer and Green suspect a thief—namely, “The Chameleon,” a terrorist leader no one has ever seen and who many believe doesn’t actually exist. But someone has the nukes, and JSOC has no idea where this villain plans on detonating them. McManus’ energetic tale boasts a stellar cast. Some are returning characters, from Green to MI6 analyst Fiona Collins, whose long-distance relationship with Palmer is on the brink of collapse. The story spotlights memorable baddies as well, like the man who, in periodic appearances, drives a truck with pilfered nukes in the back. There are also a few mysteries: Which country is targeted, and, if The Chameleon is real, what is the villain’s true identity? Action scenes come in quick but exhilarating bursts: “The detonation caught the SUV on fire. Once it was ablaze, it exploded. Smoke filled the first floor of the house. There was a gaping hole where the front door had been.” McManus adds a delightful twist at the end and leaves room for another installment.

An array of engaging characters drives a fast-paced, absorbing terrorist tale.

Pub Date: Aug. 4, 2021

ISBN: 978-1-64704-375-9

Page Count: 358

Publisher: Bay Beach Books

Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2021

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DEVOLUTION

A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.

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Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).

A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.

A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.

Pub Date: June 16, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine

Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020

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THE GOD OF THE WOODS

"Don't go into the woods" takes on unsettling new meaning in Moore's blend of domestic drama and crime novel.

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Many years after her older brother, Bear, went missing, Barbara Van Laar vanishes from the same sleepaway camp he did, leading to dark, bitter truths about her wealthy family.

One morning in 1975 at Camp Emerson—an Adirondacks summer camp owned by her family—it's discovered that 13-year-old Barbara isn't in her bed. A problem case whose unhappily married parents disdain her goth appearance and "stormy" temperament, Barbara is secretly known by one bunkmate to have slipped out every night after bedtime. But no one has a clue where's she permanently disappeared to, firing speculation that she was taken by a local serial killer known as Slitter. As Jacob Sluiter, he was convicted of 11 murders in the 1960s and recently broke out of prison. He's the one, people say, who should have been prosecuted for Bear's abduction, not a gardener who was framed. Leave it to the young and unproven assistant investigator, Judy Luptack, to press forward in uncovering the truth, unswayed by her bullying father and male colleagues who question whether women are "cut out for this work." An unsavory group portrait of the Van Laars emerges in which the children's father cruelly abuses their submissive mother, who is so traumatized by the loss of Bear—and the possible role she played in it—that she has no love left for her daughter. Picking up on the themes of families in search of themselves she explored in Long Bright River (2020), Moore draws sympathy to characters who have been subjected to spousal, parental, psychological, and physical abuse. As rich in background detail and secondary mysteries as it is, this ever-expansive, intricate, emotionally engaging novel never seems overplotted. Every piece falls skillfully into place and every character, major and minor, leaves an imprint.

"Don't go into the woods" takes on unsettling new meaning in Moore's blend of domestic drama and crime novel.

Pub Date: July 2, 2024

ISBN: 9780593418918

Page Count: 496

Publisher: Riverhead

Review Posted Online: April 13, 2024

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024

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