Plenty of flaws in the main character but few in this satisfying thriller.
A Drug Enforcement Administration agent heads south of the border on her own, to the regret of many.
Diane “Hardball” Harbaugh has helped put a lot of drug dealers behind bars. “You got two speeds, girl,” her partner says. “Legal eagle and meth dealer.” A confidential informant named Oscar tracks her down in a northern Michigan cabin and shoots himself right in front of her, saying she’s ruined his life. She wonders, “Did she make all the boys cry?” The suicide means she has a whole lot to explain to her superiors, but her troubles quickly become more pressing. A mysterious caller summons her to Mexico to meet a drug lord named El Capataz, who says he needs her help. Her partner wisely advises, “You’re not going to meet a cartel underboss without backup, Diane.” So does she coordinate a response with her superiors? Noooooo, she goes on her own without backup, “half-cocked” and completely against protocol, hoping for a big win to salvage her career. El Capataz has his own reasons to tell her an “enorme” secret, but Diane doesn’t really know if she’ll live or die. “There’s no telling which way your luck’s actually running till the whole thing’s been played out,” her soon-to-be-left-behind partner says, and then it’s too late. The woman has a whole lot more bravery than sense, but that makes for the good story this is. There’s plenty of violence and sharp shards of Spanish-language profanity from men like Tomás, a Zeta gang member with only one skill: He knows how to “delete” people. In this world, “Cash is the chain of command. Money gives the orders.” The story has great lines like “he was as fit as an orchestra of fiddles” and “her whole body was smiling.” Whether or not Hardball’s body still smiles at the end of her journey is for the reader to discover. Either way, she is one tough mujer.
Plenty of flaws in the main character but few in this satisfying thriller.Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-282517-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ecco/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
A weird, wild ride.
Celebrity scandal and a haunted lake drive the narrative in this bestselling author’s latest serving of subtly ironic suspense.
Sager’s debut, Final Girls (2017), was fun and beautifully crafted. His most recent novels—Home Before Dark (2020) and Survive the Night (2021) —have been fun and a bit rickety. His new novel fits that mold. Narrator Casey Fletcher grew up watching her mother dazzle audiences, and then she became an actor herself. While she never achieves the “America’s sweetheart” status her mother enjoyed, Casey makes a career out of bit parts in movies and on TV and meatier parts onstage. Then the death of her husband sends her into an alcoholic spiral that ends with her getting fired from a Broadway play. When paparazzi document her substance abuse, her mother exiles her to the family retreat in Vermont. Casey has a dry, droll perspective that persists until circumstances overwhelm her, and if you’re getting a Carrie Fisher vibe from Casey Fletcher, that is almost certainly not an accident. Once in Vermont, she passes the time drinking bourbon and watching the former supermodel and the tech mogul who live across the lake through a pair of binoculars. Casey befriends Katherine Royce after rescuing her when she almost drowns and soon concludes that all is not well in Katherine and Tom’s marriage. Then Katherine disappears….It would be unfair to say too much about what happens next, but creepy coincidences start piling up, and eventually, Casey has to face the possibility that maybe some of the eerie legends about Lake Greene might have some truth to them. Sager certainly delivers a lot of twists, and he ventures into what is, for him, new territory. Are there some things that don’t quite add up at the end? Maybe, but asking that question does nothing but spoil a highly entertaining read.
A weird, wild ride.Pub Date: June 21, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-18319-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: March 29, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2022
As an adjunct member says, “You’re not a family, you’re a force.” Exactly, though not in the way you’d expect.
The ne’er-do-well son of a successful Irish American family gets dragged into criminal complications that suggest the rest of the Devlins aren’t exactly the upstanding citizens they appear.
The first 35 years in the life of Thomas “TJ” Devlin have been one disappointment after another to his parents, lawyers who founded a prosperous insurance and reinsurance firm, and his more successful siblings, John and Gabby. A longtime alcoholic who’s been unemployable ever since he did time for an incident involving his ex-girlfriend Carrie’s then 2-year-old daughter, TJ is nominally an investigator for Devlin & Devlin, but everyone knows the post is a sinecure. Things change dramatically when golden-boy John tells TJ that he just killed Neil Lemaire, an accountant for D&D client Runstan Electronics. Their speedy return to the murder scene reveals no corpse, so the brothers breathe easier—until Lemaire turns up shot to death in his car. John’s way of avoiding anything that might jeopardize his status as heir apparent to D&D is to throw TJ under the bus, blaming him for everything John himself has done and adding that you can’t trust anything his brother has said since he’s fallen off the wagon. TJ, who’s maintained his sobriety a day at a time for nearly two years, feels outraged, but neither the police investigating the murder nor his nearest and dearest care about his feelings. Forget the forgettable mystery, whose solution will leave you shrugging instead of gasping, and focus on the circular firing squad of the Devlins, and you’ll have a much better time than TJ.
As an adjunct member says, “You’re not a family, you’re a force.” Exactly, though not in the way you’d expect.Pub Date: March 26, 2024
ISBN: 9780525539704
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
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