This frightening tale of a Christian heroine battling satanic forces emphasizes the power of prayer, forgiveness, and love.
A psycho killer, several cops, and a suburban mom become intertwined with angels and demons in this faith-based paranormal thriller.
If a movie should ever be made of this final installment in Faggioli’s (One In A Million, 2016, etc.) trilogy, the Eagles’ “Hotel California” might be a contender for the theme song. Like the tune’s lyrics, book passages reference voices that call in the middle of the night, characters who are prisoners of their own devices, and spirits that could be in heaven or could be in hell. The trilogy’s main character, Kyle Fasano, continues to suffer the cosmic aftershocks of his act of adultery as he travels other realms unaware of his intended destination. The angel known as the Gray Man, who accompanies him, acts as a heavenly detective on the hunt for Kyle’s wife, Tamara. She’s been taken prisoner by the unhinged Troy Forester, a slave to the devil himself. Tamara grew up in Bolivia, where her missionary parents taught her that “God speaks to us in all situations.” That belief allows her to withstand recent events, including her cheating husband’s supernatural disappearance and her own kidnapping from the home in which she lived as a single mom with her two children. But they had not been alone in the dwelling; something had been hiding under a bed, and it wasn’t dust bunnies. It was evil that came into the residence through an old, rusted lantern a co-worker had left on the doorstep. The true star of this scary volume is Tamara. Hell hath no fury like this captured woman, a committed Christian and certified badass with a mean right hook and killer moves with a hose. Good and evil take turns in the spotlight, with the latter generally resulting in quicker page turning, such as the violent episode in which Kyle and the Gray Man encounter piranhalike, toothed demons, who split to multiply by regeneration (“They simply dug their fingers into their faces, through their own skin…as they tore themselves completely in half”). The pacing is swift and the dialogue believable. Loose strings from the first two books tie together, and there is no unnecessary prologue as in the previous volume.
This frightening tale of a Christian heroine battling satanic forces emphasizes the power of prayer, forgiveness, and love.Pub Date: Aug. 10, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9978974-6-3
Page Count: 370
Publisher: Atticus Creative
Review Posted Online: Sept. 7, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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