A light and enjoyable mystery that doesn’t require too much soul-searching from the audience.
When murder and mayhem happen in Oxford, Georgia, law enforcement can call on a professor at the local two-year college—who is always ready to go off and sleuth.
In this debut novel, it’s 1961 and two black Boy Scouts and a scout master are killed in a blast in a popular cave near Tennessee. Oxford biology and chemistry professor Dr. Will Hampton quickly disposes of that case: no sinister intent involved, just an unfortunate gasoline leak from a nearby abandoned service station. But then, closer to home, events conspire to send him searching for human bones at an abandoned farm. Oh, but first he meets the lovely Liza and, quick as that, they fall in love and find themselves married. But back to the bones: He finds three shallow graves, grim resting places of three young, pregnant women, two white and one black—while someone is shooting at him. Clearly, a serial killer dispatched these women and the hunt is on. Liza makes a breakthrough (yes, in the finest detective tradition, readers now have a husband and wife team). Hampton and Liza try to clear up the mysteries and punish the evildoers, resulting in many plot twists, some clever and some not so much. In his series opener, Edwards is sometimes an awkward writer (“Conway’s house was a beautiful stone house”). But he produces a strong plot, which he moves along briskly in short paragraphs. Unfortunately, he makes some rookie mistakes. First, there is no background, real character development, or conflict. Readers never find out why Hampton has become the go-to guy in these crime cases. And there are simply too many easy coincidences. It boils down to what may be called the novelist as puppeteer: Determined that things will work out for the best, Edwards imposes on readers’ credulity. For example, when Liza is instantly agreeable to a plan that she and Hampton adopt his surprise illegitimate child, readers will likely think, “Really?”
A light and enjoyable mystery that doesn’t require too much soul-searching from the audience.Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-984374-94-3
Page Count: 152
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 7, 2018
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
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
© Copyright 2024 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.
bookshelf
