An often compelling tale of small-town secrets and personal growth.
In Hansberger’s debut novel, a mysterious family of newcomers to a small town forms a friendship with an aspiring journalist.
After Callie Lou James abandons her pursuit of a journalism degree at UCLA to support her recently widowed mother, she picks up freelance work in her small hometown of Willoughby, Georgia. A dog-walking accident leads her to meet the perplexing William Smith, who rushes to her aid. Callie tries to be friendly, but he’s cagey about revealing facts about himself, other than that he’s a retired gardener. When she lucks into a job writing the gardening column for the local Willoughby Tribune, she soon asks William for help. Locals are suspicious of the reclusive William, his adult daughter Mary, and young grandson Johnny, but Callie establishes a bond with the family. Hansberger does a fine job of portraying life in a small town, and effectively portrays Callie finding her feet again as she connects with gossipy high school friends and her childhood crush, J. B. Taylor, who’s now a police officer. The revelation of the Smith family’s secrets is intriguingly drawn out, making for a compelling narrative that will keep readers engaged as Callie uses her investigative skills to understand her new friends. However, the protagonist’s single-mindedness and self-centered manner make her unlikable at times, as when she submits a human-interest piece on the very private William to a writing competition. That said, her heart is in the right place, and the narrative does see her grow as a person as she rides out a period of great transition. Hansberger’s novel combines romance and thriller aspects, and even has the feel of a coming-of-age tale as Callie rebuilds her life after the death of her father. It all makes for an intriguing read that will keep readers on their toes.
An often compelling tale of small-town secrets and personal growth.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 9781509253012
Page Count: 298
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Review Posted Online: Nov. 13, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Soapy, suspenseful fun.
A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.
Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.
Soapy, suspenseful fun.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227325
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.
A medical student is assigned an overnight shift to observe a Long Island hospital’s psychiatric ward and help with emergencies. You’d never guess what happens next.
Amy Brenner isn’t even interested in psychiatry, the one medical specialty she’s never considered for her own career. Nor is she interested any more in Cameron Berger, the classmate who ended their relationship so that he could spend more time studying, and she’s not pleased to learn that he’s switched his rotation with another student so he can spend some of the next 13 hours persuading Amy to rekindle their romance. Predictably, Cam will be the least of Amy’s troubles. Apart from Dr. Richard Beck and nurse Ramona Dutton, everyone else on Ward D is much more dangerous, from elderly Mary Cummings, whose knitting needles aren’t plastic but sharpened steel, to William Schoenfeld, who’s stopped taking the medications that were supposed to silence the voices telling him to kill people, to Damon Sawyer, who’s confined in Seclusion One and can’t possibly escape, unless a power outage neutralizes the locks. Most threatening of all is Jade Carpenter, whose close friendship with Amy ended eight years ago when Amy turned her in for what ended up being only one of a whole series of thrill crimes. McFadden measures out the complications, revelations, and betrayals with such an expert hand that readers anxiously trying to figure out whom Amy can trust as her goal shifts from ticking off a toilsome requirement to surviving the night may well end up wondering whom they can trust themselves. And isn’t provoking that kind of paranoia what medical thrillers are all about?
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.Pub Date: March 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227271
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
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