Next book

LIBERTY'S LAST STAND

This bilge is a middle finger in the face of most Americans, but if you happen to think Barry Soetorobama is the devil...

An action-packed thriller and political rant featuring series standbys Jake Grafton and Tommy Carmellini.

Islamic terrorists have snuck across the Mexican border and carried out vicious attacks that have killed hundreds of Americans. President Barry Soetoro (the name Barack Obama really used until he was 10) suspends the Constitution and declares martial law. Barack—er, Barry—is a gun-confiscating dictator, an emperor, and most likely a closeted gay man who needs the welfare-seeking, baby-popping Mexican illegals as future Democratic voters. Every right-thinking citizen is simply fed up to the gills with him. “It’s a miracle someone hasn’t shot at him before now,” a character says. “But why shoot him?” thinks Carmellini—the Republicans would win in November in a landslide anyway. But Soetoro cancels the election and arrests many prominent conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh. This is the crisis Carmellini has been waiting for. “If you live in America, you gotta have some guns,” he says, “so when the political contract falls apart…yeah!” So it’s no wonder that the good people of Texas decide to secede and re-form the Republic of Texas. Oba—sorry, Soetoro—intends to crush the rebellion at any cost. That means civil war, with civilians at grave risk on both sides. Power plants and bridges get destroyed, and hardly just in Texas. Evil Muslims play a dramatic role both in provoking the national crisis and in bringing about its dramatic resolution. “I am America’s hope,” declaims Soetoro in a final explosion of ego. The author doesn’t even bother to invent a completely fictional villain—no need, when he has the current president to slur.

This bilge is a middle finger in the face of most Americans, but if you happen to think Barry Soetorobama is the devil incarnate, then by all means buy it. The government knows where you live, though, so keep that AR-15 loaded and by your nightstand.

Pub Date: June 13, 2016

ISBN: 978-1-62157-507-8

Page Count: 544

Publisher: Regnery

Review Posted Online: May 16, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016

Next book

DARK MATTER

Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.

A man walks out of a bar and his life becomes a kaleidoscope of altered states in this science-fiction thriller.

Crouch opens on a family in a warm, resonant domestic moment with three well-developed characters. At home in Chicago’s Logan Square, Jason Dessen dices an onion while his wife, Daniela, sips wine and chats on the phone. Their son, Charlie, an appealing 15-year-old, sketches on a pad. Still, an undertone of regret hovers over the couple, a preoccupation with roads not taken, a theme the book will literally explore, in multifarious ways. To start, both Jason and Daniela abandoned careers that might have soared, Jason as a physicist, Daniela as an artist. When Charlie was born, he suffered a major illness. Jason was forced to abandon promising research to teach undergraduates at a small college. Daniela turned from having gallery shows to teaching private art lessons to middle school students. On this bracing October evening, Jason visits a local bar to pay homage to Ryan Holder, a former college roommate who just received a major award for his work in neuroscience, an honor that rankles Jason, who, Ryan says, gave up on his career. Smarting from the comment, Jason suffers “a sucker punch” as he heads home that leaves him “standing on the precipice.” From behind Jason, a man with a “ghost white” face, “red, pursed lips," and "horrifying eyes” points a gun at Jason and forces him to drive an SUV, following preset navigational directions. At their destination, the abductor forces Jason to strip naked, beats him, then leads him into a vast, abandoned power plant. Here, Jason meets men and women who insist they want to help him. Attempting to escape, Jason opens a door that leads him into a series of dark, strange, yet eerily familiar encounters that sometimes strain credibility, especially in the tale's final moments.

Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.

Pub Date: July 26, 2016

ISBN: 978-1-101-90422-0

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016

Awards & Accolades

Our Verdict

  • Our Verdict
  • GET IT


  • Kirkus Reviews'
    Best Books Of 2015


  • New York Times Bestseller

Next book

PRETTY GIRLS

Slaughter (Cop Town, 2014, etc.) is so uncompromising in following her blood trails to the darkest places imaginable that...

Awards & Accolades

Our Verdict

  • Our Verdict
  • GET IT


  • Kirkus Reviews'
    Best Books Of 2015


  • New York Times Bestseller

Twenty-four years after a traumatic disappearance tore a Georgia family apart, Slaughter’s scorching stand-alone picks them up and shreds them all over again.

The Carrolls have never been the same since 19-year-old Julia vanished. After years of fruitlessly pestering the police, her veterinarian father, Sam, killed himself; her librarian mother, Helen, still keeps the girl's bedroom untouched, just in case. Julia’s sisters have been equally scarred. Lydia Delgado has sold herself for drugs countless times, though she’s been clean for years now; Claire Scott has just been paroled after knee-capping her tennis partner for a thoughtless remark. The evening that Claire’s ankle bracelet comes off, her architect husband, Paul, is callously murdered before her eyes and, without a moment's letup, she stumbles on a mountainous cache of snuff porn. Paul’s business partner, Adam Quinn, demands information from Claire and threatens her with dire consequences if she doesn’t deliver. The Dunwoody police prove as ineffectual as ever. FBI agent Fred Nolan is more suavely menacing than helpful. So Lydia and Claire, who’ve grown so far apart that they’re virtual strangers, are unwillingly thrown back on each other for help. Once she’s plunged you into this maelstrom, Slaughter shreds your own nerves along with those of the sisters, not simply by a parade of gruesome revelations—though she supplies them in abundance—but by peeling back layer after layer from beloved family members Claire and Lydia thought they knew. The results are harrowing.

Slaughter (Cop Town, 2014, etc.) is so uncompromising in following her blood trails to the darkest places imaginable that she makes most of her high-wire competition look pallid, formulaic, or just plain fake.

Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-06-242905-6

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: June 30, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2015

Close Quickview