A complex political thriller for adventurous readers—and well worth the effort.
Following the reunification of Germany, the KGB recruits an operative to retrieve stolen bearer bonds crucial to Russia’s Canadian presence in this debut novel.
Kubiak’s tale combines international intrigue, the Mafia, the rise of Vladimir Putin, and existential musings on the meaning of life. After a young Romani tells Thomas Miller, “Death is all around you,” the German national receives his KGB assignment with a warning that echoes those words: “Expect trouble.” Miller, a hit man, secret agent, and deeply troubled soul, meticulously covers his tracks, ultimately arriving at a remote cabin in the Canadian woods fully armed. The plot twists and turns: Does his mission involve a war between rival mob factions? Is there another party involved? One of the Mafia groups approaches Miller, claiming their interests coincide. But no one can be trusted. Miller’s own people murder his girlfriend back in Germany, ostensibly to give him more incentive but also adding another layer of mystery: Who knew about the hit? Though the agent is described as having no soul, he goes to church at one point and later to a shrine. In both instances he engages rather prophetic priests in extensive and searching philosophical discourses. Kubiak’s unusually constructed book bounces around in time and point of view. At times, it is intimately first person, delving deep into Miller’s psyche; at other moments, it holds readers at arm’s length (“The big Benz started moving as the man reached into the glove compartment, taking out a big Beretta automatic”). The style reinforces the already deep mystery, leaving readers unsure of exactly what is going on or what Miller or any of the other characters will do next. The ending holds even more surprises as minor players turn out to be vastly more important than first perceived. The author has put together a well-written, thought-provoking mystery with political and philosophical ramifications that bear on events in today’s headlines.
A complex political thriller for adventurous readers—and well worth the effort.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5255-1858-4
Page Count: 270
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2018
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
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
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