Wheels within wheels within wheels, cunningly intermeshed by a master who sweats every nightmarish detail.
Fasten your seatbelts. Fiendish Freeman has engineered another peerlessly bumpy ride.
It’s not until after the worst Fourth of July imaginable—her boss fires her, her boyfriend texts to dump her for her roommate, and she’s pronounced dead after drinking and fighting too much at a reception—that Las Vegas copywriter Hallie Evers’ real problems kick in. When she wakes up some time after Dr. Reed Smith, another guest at the reception, miraculously restarts her heart, she starts being plagued by vivid, disturbing dreams that feel “more like memories…someone else’s memories.” She has vivid, detailed recollections of Boston, a city she’s never visited. The name of Tyler Reyes, the founding CEO of Boston-based medical device developer Hyppolex, seems as familiar as if they’d met, despite the fact that they clearly haven’t. Her dreams about the death of a young woman named Savannah make her feel as if this is her sister, though she’s an only child. A pair of assailants nearly kidnap her before they’re run off, and Todd Kivel, the private eye who appears out of nowhere to rescue her, gets killed for his trouble. Clearly Hallie’s being tracked by unknown parties plotting some deeper game, and many readers will figure out what that game is before Freeman confirms their suspicions. But this big reveal isn’t the climax; it’s only the pivot to a new set of mysteries Hallie steps into when she leaves Las Vegas for Boston and begins to sense what an extravagant set of crimes, past and present, underlie the dreams that don’t feel like dreams at all.
Wheels within wheels within wheels, cunningly intermeshed by a master who sweats every nightmarish detail.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-3508-8
Page Count: 348
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
As usual, Evanovich handles the funny stuff better (much better) than the mystery stuff.
Stephanie Plum’s 31st adventure shows that Trenton’s preeminent fugitive-apprehension agent still has plenty of tricks up her sleeve, and needs every one of them.
The current caseload for Stephanie and Lula—the ex-prostitute file clerk at her cousin Vincent Plum’s bail bonds company, who serves as her unflappable sidekick—begins with two “failures to appear.” Eugene Fleck is suspected of being Robin Hoodie, who robs from the rich and, yes, distributes the proceeds to the poor. Racketeer Bruno Jug, who’s missed his court date on charges of tax evasion, is also suspected of drugging and raping a 14-year-old. But neither of these fugitives can hold a candle to Zoran Djordjevic, aka Fang, a self-proclaimed vampire wanted in connection with the gruesome fate of his late wife and three other missing women. As usual, Stephanie’s personal life is just as helter-skelter as her professional life as a bounty hunter. She’s managed to get herself engaged both to Det. Joe Morelli, of the Trenton PD, and Ranger, a former Special Forces agent who runs a private security firm; she thinks she may be pregnant; and she’s willing to marry the father, whichever of her fiances that turns out to be. On top of it all, her nothingburger schoolmate Herbert Slovinski suddenly pops up at one of the funerals she ferries her Grandma Mazur to, hitting on her relentlessly and gilding his importunities by cleaning and painting her shabby apartment and laying new carpet. Luckily, Lula’s on hand to offer cupcakes that stave off the worst disasters, and whenever this hodgepodge threatens to slow down, another FTA appears, or fails to appear.
As usual, Evanovich handles the funny stuff better (much better) than the mystery stuff.Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2024
ISBN: 9781668003138
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2024
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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