Engaging characters, wit, and suspense elevate this rip-curling page-turner.
The third book in Jones’ mystery series sees a deadly sniper trying to disrupt a surf competition.
Thad Hanlon tries to balance his dangerous job as a private eye with careful fathering of his 11-year-old son, mindful that Zael Hanlon has already lost one parent: His mom, Marissa, is now on “angel duty.” But when a sniper’s bullets fly across California’s Pismo Beach during the junior surf trial competition, wounding Zael and two of his teammates, Thad vows to deliver vengeance. Those around him don’t agree with his plan; even “quasi-fiancée” and senior detective Naiya Ygnacio withholds information about the investigation from Thad, while his son’s surf team coach, Gev Burian, advises forgiveness over revenge. Meanwhile, the team seems to have found a way to keep safe, eventually practicing under the intimidating protection of a Bakersfield gang boss and some of his gang members. But Thad’s home is viciously vandalized, surf team member Sebastian Giuffrida’s gunshot wound becomes life-threatening, and two more murders take place. Thad and business partner Bri de la Guerra begin to realize that someone from their past may be responsible for all this deadly mayhem. Together, they formulate an audacious plan, unapproved by the police, where they’ll attempt to draw out, entrap, and enact justice on the perpetrator. Jones excels at blending elements that really shouldn’t mesh, such as surfing detectives, kids, violence, and complicated prickly romance, yet somehow everything coheres into an appealingly suspenseful whole. The wide variety of humor he employs is a large part of the book’s success. Jones enjoys deploying dad jokes, such as Thad requesting “diet cola on an IV drip” in the morning, as well as tween-speak (“Gnarly-mongus, my bro!”). Well-rounded, fully dimensional characters are another plus. Coach Gev’s a “surf therapist,” and when Thad has a problem, he gets on the waves and works through his demons. Zael is an especially nuanced character whose love-hate relationship with his father is particularly resonant. The beachy Pismo backdrop completes the winning formula: This is a California where “herd-like” tourists aimlessly wander among surf shops and seafood restaurants, but residents share a deep love for the nearby Pacific Ocean.
Engaging characters, wit, and suspense elevate this rip-curling page-turner.Pub Date: July 27, 2026
ISBN: 9781509266180
Page Count: 396
Publisher: Wild Rose Press
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.
Another sweltering month in Charlotte, another boatload of mysteries past and present for overworked, overstressed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.
A week after the night she chases but fails to catch a mysterious trespasser outside her town house, some unknown party texts Tempe four images of a corpse that looks as if it’s been chewed by wild hogs, because it has been. Showboat Medical Examiner Margot Heavner makes it clear that, breaking with her department’s earlier practice (The Bone Collection, 2016, etc.), she has no intention of calling in Tempe as a consultant and promptly identifies the faceless body herself as that of a young Asian man. Nettled by several errors in Heavner’s analysis, and even more by her willingness to share the gory details at a press conference, Tempe launches her own investigation, which is not so much off the books as against the books. Heavner isn’t exactly mollified when Tempe, aided by retired police detective Skinny Slidell and a host of experts, puts a name to the dead man. But the hints of other crimes Tempe’s identification uncovers, particularly crimes against children, spur her on to redouble her efforts despite the new M.E.’s splenetic outbursts. Before he died, it seems, Felix Vodyanov was linked to a passenger ferry that sank in 1994, an even earlier U.S. government project to research biological agents that could control human behavior, the hinky spiritual retreat Sparkling Waters, the dark web site DeepUnder, and the disappearances of at least four schoolchildren, two of whom have also turned up dead. And why on earth was Vodyanov carrying Tempe’s own contact information? The mounting evidence of ever more and ever worse skulduggery will pull Tempe deeper and deeper down what even she sees as a rabbit hole before she confronts a ringleader implicated in “Drugs. Fraud. Breaking and entering. Arson. Kidnapping. How does attempted murder sound?”
Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9821-3888-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
A vivid, exciting page-turner from one of our most interesting authors of historical fiction.
When a man accused of rape turns up dead, an Early American town seeks justice amid rumors and controversy.
Lawhon’s fifth work of historical fiction is inspired by the true story and diaries of midwife Martha Ballard of Hallowell, Maine, a character she brings to life brilliantly here. As Martha tells her patient in an opening chapter set in 1789, “You need not fear….In all my years attending women in childbirth, I have never lost a mother.” This track record grows in numerous compelling scenes of labor and delivery, particularly one in which Martha has to clean up after the mistakes of a pompous doctor educated at Harvard, one of her nemeses in a town that roils with gossip and disrespect for women’s abilities. Supposedly, the only time a midwife can testify in court is regarding paternity when a woman gives birth out of wedlock—but Martha also takes the witness stand in the rape case against a dead man named Joshua Burgess and his living friend Col. Joseph North, whose role as judge in local court proceedings has made the victim, Rebecca Foster, reluctant to make her complaint public. Further complications are numerous: North has control over the Ballard family's lease on their property; Rebecca is carrying the child of one of her rapists; Martha’s son was seen fighting with Joshua Burgess on the day of his death. Lawhon weaves all this into a richly satisfying drama that moves suspensefully between childbed, courtroom, and the banks of the Kennebec River. The undimmed romance between 40-something Martha and her husband, Ephraim, adds a racy flair to the proceedings. Knowing how rare the quality of their relationship is sharpens the intensity of Martha’s gaze as she watches the romantic lives of her grown children unfold. As she did with Nancy Wake in Code Name Hélène (2020), Lawhon creates a stirring portrait of a real-life heroine and, as in all her books, includes an endnote with detailed background.
A vivid, exciting page-turner from one of our most interesting authors of historical fiction.Pub Date: Dec. 5, 2023
ISBN: 9780385546874
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Aug. 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
