A fine thriller, with a bittersweet love story that lingers long after the last page.
A legal thriller that does double duty as a poignant tale of a love challenged by the indignities of Alzheimer’s and the corrupt judicial system that refuses to acknowledge them.
Woodrow “Woody” Wilson has begun to forget things. He’s having not just the typical memory slips that increase as a man enters his 80s, but telling lapses such as not recognizing family members or believing their good intentions. When such moments arise, Woody takes off in his truck, and his loving son, Waylon, and wife, Maggie, tail him as he revisits cherished places from his past. One day, however, Woody ditches his truck and disappears with an unknown man. The family enlists the help of investigator Sherwood “Shot Glass” Reynolds, a recovering alcoholic who witnessed his own father’s battle with dementia. Reynolds soon identifies the stranger as Linus Schmutzer Jr., aka Doc Smooth, a psychiatrist forced to resign for conducting unauthorized experiments on Alzheimer’s patients. Yet all is not as it seems, as Waylon and Reynolds unravel a wartime connection between the abductor and abductee that stretches back to Auschwitz. A dangerous lapse into dementia leads Woody to hold a deputy at gunpoint, which results in his arrest. His court-appointed lawyer, Pythagoras “Thag” Clemons, lives a woebegone existence that makes Reynolds’ sad life shine by comparison. Thag is also painfully familiar with Alzheimer’s, and he joins the motley crew, which soon includes Woody’s cellmates, in an audacious plan to get justice for the ailing World War II veteran. Woodfin (The Lazarus Deception, 2013, etc.), an attorney with several thrillers to his name, expertly combines the detailed machinations of the legal system with a fast-moving, twisting plot that leads to an unanticipated climax. His tender portrayal of Woody and Maggie’s deeply felt love is a welcome surprise, as are the many near-poetic depictions of dementia that evoke pathos without a hint of sentimentality.
A fine thriller, with a bittersweet love story that lingers long after the last page.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2012
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Amazon Digital Services
Review Posted Online: March 11, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
A tantalizing, otherworldy adventure with imagination that burns like fire.
The third installment of this fantasy series (The Bone Season, 2013; The Mime Order, 2015) expands the reaches of the fight against Scion far beyond London.
Paige Mahoney, though only 19, serves as the Underqueen of the Mime Order. She's the leader of the Unnatural community in London, a city serving under the ever more militaristic Scion, whose government is based on ridding the streets of "enemy" clairvoyants. But Paige knows the truth about Scion's roots—that an Unnatural and immortal race called the Rephaim, who come from the Netherworld, forced Scion into existence to gain control over the growing human clairvoyant community. Scion’s hatred of clairvoyants now runs so deep that Paige is forced to consider moving her entire syndicate into hiding while she aims to stop Scion's next attack: there are rumors that Senshield, a scanner able to detect certain levels of clairvoyance, is going portable. Which means no Unnatural citizen is safe—their safe houses, their back-alley routes, are all at risk of detection. Paige’s main enemy this time around is Hildred Vance, mastermind of Scion’s military branch, ScionIDE. Vance creates terror by anticipating her opponent’s next moves, so with each step that Paige and her team take to dismantle Senshield, Vance is hovering nearby to toy with Paige’s will. Luckily, Paige is never separated for long from her Rephaite ally, Warden, as his presence is grounding. But their growing relationship, strengthened by their connection to the spirit world, takes a back seat to the constant, fast-paced action. The mesmerizing qualities of this series—insight into the different orders of clairvoyance as well as the intricately imagined details of Paige’s “dreamwalking” gift, with which she is able to enter others’ minds—fade to the background as this seven-part series climbs to its highest point of tension. Shannon’s world begins to feel more generically dystopian, but as Paige fights to locate and understand the spiritual energy powering Senshield, it is never less than captivating.
A tantalizing, otherworldy adventure with imagination that burns like fire.Pub Date: March 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-63286-624-0
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
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