A slow-moving but ultimately gripping crime drama.
A debut novel focuses on a killer in 1970s New England.
Maurice “Mo” Lumen may be 24 years old but he acts much like a preadolescent. Ever since Mo suffered a seizure at 11, he has acted differently. His main passions are baseball and fishing. To most, he is “a respectful, affable young man with limited maturity and intellect” who works as a groundskeeper at a college in Rhode Island. But does he have a dark side? When young women start turning up dead in the area, Mo eventually becomes a suspect. Cue FBI agent Francis “Frank” Palmer. Frank is so committed to his work that his personal life has unraveled. It doesn’t help that he’s been “exposed to the horrors lurking in society’s shadows.” Still, the man gets results. He even gives guest lectures at Harvard. When Mo and Frank finally cross paths, it is October 1975. The Red Sox are in the World Series. Mo has befriended a suspicious professor who clearly wants more than to just watch baseball with the young man. The media have dubbed whomever is responsible for the recent murders the Pastoral Predator. Could the predator really be Mo? At over 500 pages, Lebeau’s series opener takes the long route to finding out who the monster is. Readers learn about Mo’s family background, the men he works with as a groundskeeper, and the journey that brought him to Rhode Island. Likewise, Frank’s details include the time he told his father he didn’t want to be a lawyer, a meal he had with serial killer Ted Bundy, and what he thinks of the buildings at Harvard. All of this information makes for a slow burn. But while the story’s pace can be painstaking, once all the cards are on the table, the tension is immense. Who is the Pastoral Predator? Just as readers think they are sure of the answer, serious doubts are likely to arise.
A slow-moving but ultimately gripping crime drama.Pub Date: May 10, 2022
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 554
Publisher: Books Fluent
Review Posted Online: April 21, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
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
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