by Ruth Barrett ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 8, 2015
A laudable protagonist who can easily carry another book, one with a bit more mystery and intrigue.
Investigators delve into a case involving possible international espionage and a heart attack that’s looking more like murder in this thriller.
Private eye Jordan Anderson’s latest client is Sasha Goldman, an executive secretary at U.S. Navy contractor Kingman Corporation. Sasha’s worried that boss Shaun O’Riley’s uncharacteristically furtive behavior (for example, daily private meetings) indicates that something illegal is happening at the company. There’s also the mysterious cargo intended for Kingman’s Seattle warehouse that inexplicably wound up in Afghanistan. Jordan sees potential for information via George Kilburn, investigator for the Senate oversight committee, who Sasha says met with Shaun. A mutual friend sets Jordan and George up on a date, but Jordan, slyly extracting intelligence, so impresses George that he hires her. The cargo, it turns out, was transporting a military security system, and George believes Jordan can work covertly under the pretense of investigating an employee’s complaint. The two first check out Chester Rafferty, the disbursement officer who died of a heart attack shortly before the cargo’s shipping date. No history of heart problems makes Chester’s death suspicious, of course, while Boris Urich, Chester’s replacement, may have a few too many secrets in his past. At the same time, Jordan and George’s professional relationship leads to romance, making her nervous when he heads to Afghanistan—and maybe toward danger. The novel is a breezy, unhurried mystery. With Boris the strongest suspect, Barrett (New Beginnings, 2013) concentrates on the investigation, even Sasha’s seemingly trivial Internet search involving a probable accomplice. There are definitely plot turns, including Boris’ motive (other than theft). But the likable Jordan gets a little too much praise from George and others when most of what she does is basic research—a mere perusal of the autopsy report is noticeably revealing. Still, camaraderie among the characters makes the good guys engaging, particularly when nearly every gathering to recap the case is an excuse for a restaurant outing. And while piecing together the evidence is a slow process, so is the developing intimacy between Jordan and George—kisses whose measured but increasing intensity is certainly worthwhile.
A laudable protagonist who can easily carry another book, one with a bit more mystery and intrigue.Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4582-1935-0
Page Count: 214
Publisher: AbbottPress
Review Posted Online: June 9, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by J.A. Jance ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 2, 2019
Proficient but eminently predictable. Amid all the time shifts and embedded backstories, the most surprising feature is how...
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A convicted killer’s list of five people he wants dead runs the gamut from the wife he’s already had murdered to franchise heroine Ali Reynolds.
Back in the day, women came from all over to consult Santa Clarita fertility specialist Dr. Edward Gilchrist. Many of them left his care happily pregnant, never dreaming that the father of the babies they carried was none other than the physician himself, who donated his own sperm rather than that of the handsome, athletic, disease-free men pictured in his scrapbook. When Alexandra Munsey’s son, Evan, is laid low by the kidney disease he’s inherited from his biological father and she returns to Gilchrist in search of the donor’s medical records, the roof begins to fall in on him. By the time it’s done falling, he’s serving a life sentence in Folsom Prison for commissioning the death of his wife, Dawn, the former nurse and sometime egg donor who’d turned on him. With nothing left to lose, Gilchrist tattoos himself with the initials of five people he blames for his fall: Dawn; Leo Manuel Aurelio, the hit man he’d hired to dispose of her; Kaitlyn Todd, the nurse/receptionist who took Dawn’s place; Alex Munsey, whose search for records upset his apple cart; and Ali Reynolds, the TV reporter who’d helped put Alex in touch with the dozen other women who formed the Progeny Project because their children looked just like hers. No matter that Ali’s been out of both California and the news business for years; Gilchrist and his enablers know that revenge can’t possibly be served too cold. Wonder how far down that list they’ll get before Ali, aided once more by Frigg, the methodical but loose-cannon AI first introduced in Duel to the Death (2018), turns on them?
Proficient but eminently predictable. Amid all the time shifts and embedded backstories, the most surprising feature is how little the boundary-challenged AI, who gets into the case more or less inadvertently, differs from your standard human sidekick with issues.Pub Date: April 2, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-5101-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 18, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
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by Lorna Barrett ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 13, 2019
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
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