A gripping crime tale that becomes as complicated as its main character.
A hit man finds no easy career exit in this Florida thriller.
Sunny Sarasota starkly contrasts with South’s (Suicide Tango, 2019, etc.) dark story, in which titular character Tommy Darlington works as a well-paid assassin hired by “unforgiving men with silent billions.” A former Army ranger and low-profile artist, Tommy initially has no problem with the deadly commissions he refers to as “taking out the trash.” His girlfriend, Rachel, a successful novelist, supports the couple, as publicly Tommy ekes out a living as a nighttime cabbie. Rachel knows nothing about her boyfriend’s deadly business or his ill-gotten gains that amount to millions, all of which he has hidden and earmarked to fund their retirement in Costa Rica. Witnessing a higher-up known as the Old Man feed Tommy’s bespoke-suited handler, Alfred, to a dozen alligators, the hit man has a change of heart about his line of work. The shift in his attitude is bad for business, and his employers take notice. Then Rachel disappears. Readers may feel an adrenalin rush as Tommy desperately tries to find her. There’s a disconnect between his incomprehension for his employers’ “casual disregard for human life” and his own sniper activities, although some kills bother him. Snuffing out an elegant older woman who heads a foundation that a dirty organization wants in its portfolio, Tommy cries along with the doomed victim. Fans of the award-winning television series Barry will find similarities between the show’s main character and Tommy, as both are damaged, military-trained hit men with a desire to change but seemingly no way to do so. Told primarily in the first person, the novel will elicit readers’ sympathies for Tommy’s impaired psyche as he works for men dealing in the “top three commodities in the world: firearms, drugs, and humans.” The author’s descriptions—be they sexy, humorous, or terrifying—are notable: for example, “she fragranced her way to the bedroom,” “his huge sausage fingers,” and “hollow eye sockets were illuminated by a deadlight that made me rocket-vomit and cough in rolling spasms.”
A gripping crime tale that becomes as complicated as its main character.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-944855-20-8
Page Count: 276
Publisher: Adagio Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
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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