Fans of Star Trek, dime-store detective novels, or behind-the-scenes Hollywood tales will enjoy this quick read.
Spiner combines his life as an actor on Star Trek: The Next Generation with the tale of a murderously obsessive fan.
In the early 1990s, when The Next Generation is at its peak, Brent Spiner is living the life he’d always dreamed of. He plays Cmdr. Data, and aside from having to use kerosene to remove the gold makeup that turns him into his android character every day, things are going great. Then he gets a severed pig penis in the mail. The delusional fan continues to send disturbing gifts and threatens to kill Brent and other cast members. At first, Brent is wary, but he's more concerned with the show, his relationships, and the odd detective assigned to his case (who has a TNG script to plug. Hey, this is Hollywood, baby!). Then razor blades and bullets get involved, and so does the FBI. Brent soon is tangled up with a sexy FBI agent and her identical twin sister, who’s also his bodyguard; has run-ins with fans ranging from sincere to downright bizarre; and has to worry about making one of the most beloved shows on television while not actually dying. Panic attacks, nightmares, and sometimes hilarity ensue. Author Spiner calls his debut a “mem-noir,” because he weaves together Hollywood and Trekkie trivia, his experiences with real-life TNG cast and crew, his own traumatic childhood with an abusive stepfather, and an obsessive fan scenario that's not entirely made up, either. The story is quite accessible to non-Trekkies while never being overexplainy in ways fans would find tedious. Because it’s all told in a campy, dime-store–noir voice, one can never be sure what’s true and what’s fiction. Because Spiner is the victim, not the detective, he doesn’t get to break down doors or solve the crime, which makes the book less satisfying than it might have been. Spiner also sticks with the noir penchant for defining female characters by their looks, which is unfortunate. Though the writing is pithy and humorous, the book feels like it's directed at the stereotypical middle-aged, cis, male fans of the show even though TNG itself appeals to a much wider audience.
Fans of Star Trek, dime-store detective novels, or behind-the-scenes Hollywood tales will enjoy this quick read.Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-2502-7436-6
Page Count: 256
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
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
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
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