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A TINY RIPPLE OF HOPE

A multifaceted and lively hero gives this offbeat LA caper a unique flair.

In Ramon’s novel, a troubled man undertakes a quest to find a missing child.

Los Angeles resident Cole Reeves is 21 years old. After being expelled from university and fired from his job at a coffee shop, Cole’s days tend to be relatively aimless. He goes on long walks through Koreatown, meets his friend Ray for lunch, and plays ping-pong with his other friend Jamal. He “lives for” electronic dance music and has an extensive collection of t-shirts. The t-shirts are more than just clothing—his selection process is something of a ceremony, as he finds that the shirts guide him “through existence each day.” Cole’s existence can be tumultuous:  He takes prescription medicine for his mental health, and Jamal has playfully nicknamed him “51-50,” a nod to the police code for a crazy person. Still, people like Cole; women flirt with him, random children speak with him, and when a local boy is kidnapped, Cole feels a compulsion to help. As Cole goes about his search, struggling with his own mental well-being, people often mistake him for someone else—it seems they may even be mistaking him for the kidnapper. The police certainly have their suspicions. Is Cole experiencing some kind of psychotic break? Is he connected to the kidnapper in a way that he doesn’t fully understand? Perhaps his t-shirts will provide some kind of guidance; maybe a local news personality will understand that Cole is only trying to help. Or could it be that he is just another crazy person in a sprawling city teeming with them?  

Cole is a likeable, memorable, and unpredictable main character. At any given moment, he may vividly recall a traumatic moment he thought he had forgotten or decide that the time has come to go out dancing at an illegal rave. (On the benefits of the latter, he explains, “getting lost in a sea of people makes me feel more alive than anything else.”) Part of Cole’s appeal is the ease with which he shares his feelings. He also reflects on the mundane, such as how a restaurant has “fantastic meat that is not prepared like Korean barbecue even though it’s a Korean restaurant”; it all adds to the catalog of the many joys he manages to find in the world. The idea that Cole could be the same person who is involved in the disappearance of a child keeps the reader on their toes. Some of this intrigue is blunted by his interactions with supporting characters: For instance, he has a friendly relationship with a blind Korean woman named Mrs. Kim. She is a shaman who deals in traditional Korean medicine and is capable of amazing things—like determining which t-shirt Cole is wearing despite the fact that she is blind. When Cole seeks her council about his desire to help with the kidnapping case, she warns him bluntly that this “will be a difficult task” albeit a “noble one”; Cole probably could have figured that much out himself. Still, it’s compelling to see how the whole complicated situation plays out, especially with this unemployed, t-shirt-crazed, ping-pong-playing protagonist at the center.

A multifaceted and lively hero gives this offbeat LA caper a unique flair.

Pub Date: April 2, 2024

ISBN: 9798350934281

Page Count: 250

Publisher: BookBaby

Review Posted Online: Oct. 24, 2024

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WARD D

A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.

A medical student is assigned an overnight shift to observe a Long Island hospital’s psychiatric ward and help with emergencies. You’d never guess what happens next.

Amy Brenner isn’t even interested in psychiatry, the one medical specialty she’s never considered for her own career. Nor is she interested any more in Cameron Berger, the classmate who ended their relationship so that he could spend more time studying, and she’s not pleased to learn that he’s switched his rotation with another student so he can spend some of the next 13 hours persuading Amy to rekindle their romance. Predictably, Cam will be the least of Amy’s troubles. Apart from Dr. Richard Beck and nurse Ramona Dutton, everyone else on Ward D is much more dangerous, from elderly Mary Cummings, whose knitting needles aren’t plastic but sharpened steel, to William Schoenfeld, who’s stopped taking the medications that were supposed to silence the voices telling him to kill people, to Damon Sawyer, who’s confined in Seclusion One and can’t possibly escape, unless a power outage neutralizes the locks. Most threatening of all is Jade Carpenter, whose close friendship with Amy ended eight years ago when Amy turned her in for what ended up being only one of a whole series of thrill crimes. McFadden measures out the complications, revelations, and betrayals with such an expert hand that readers anxiously trying to figure out whom Amy can trust as her goal shifts from ticking off a toilsome requirement to surviving the night may well end up wondering whom they can trust themselves. And isn’t provoking that kind of paranoia what medical thrillers are all about?

A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.

Pub Date: March 4, 2025

ISBN: 9781464227271

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Poisoned Pen

Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2024

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025

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THE CRASH

Soapy, suspenseful fun.

A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.

Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.

Soapy, suspenseful fun.

Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025

ISBN: 9781464227325

Page Count: 384

Publisher: Poisoned Pen

Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025

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