Slackly plotted though occasionally spooky yarn about Boston- area ghosts—and the hardcover debut of psychic detective Ryerson Biergarten, whose cases Wright (Little Boy Lost, p. 498, etc.) has covered in several pseudonymous (``F.W. Armstrong'') paperbacks. Many of Wright's novels have imagined a twilight zone between life and death in which ghosts wander, not sure whether they're dead or alive, and into which the living may stumble. Here, this zone and its denizens are ill-defined, presented in a sometimes nearly inchoate shuffle of scenes: One ghost, a woman who inexplicably can widen her mouth to an ``impossible'' length, picks up men and takes them to deserted rooms where she reads them bad horror novels; another ghost, a woman kidnapped through a psychic ``gateway'' into the world of the dead, enjoys standing by the ocean; and yet another, that of a 90-year-old clockmaker, only curses: ``Eat my shorts!'' Among the dizzying vignettes is stitched the story of Sam Goodlow, a hit-and-run murder victim who appears (as a man; a boy; a transparent man with internal organs showing) to Biergarten—who, other than for his psychic powers, is such a colorless character that he might be a ghost himself. Through talks with Goodlow (```Dammit, I can see through your head,' Ryerson said'') plus some standard gumshoeing, Ryerson learns that Goodlow was killed as part of a plot in which a rich old woman was murdered by her doppelgÑnger in order to steal the woman's estate. The climax finds the doppelgÑnger's ghost aiming a gun at Ryerson's body while the detective's spirit—which has left his body due to a previous wound—watches. Justice prevails, but Ryerson wakes up with a terrible headache. The entire novel's a bit ghostly itself: eerie, but so thin you can see right through it.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-312-85466-8
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1992
BOOK REVIEW
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
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
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