A thrilling detective story with a sprinkling of werewolves—who could ask for more, really?
A shape-shifter teams up with the FBI to take down a criminal organization.
Terri Watson is a hardworking and slightly harried agent for the FBI in Philadelphia, specializing in organized crime. Along with her partner, Marc Peterson, Terri has been investigating a ring of Russian mobsters led by Konstantin Kretzky. Concurrently, a series of murders have been committed in the city in which the victims appear to have been torn apart by wild dogs. While in pursuit of Dieter, a money launderer working with the Russian mob, Terri and Marc witness a beast attacking their perp and begin entertaining the idea of werewolves. Alex Stepanova, a local university professor, wakes in a lab after being experimented on by Russian scientists to discover she possesses the power of shape-shifting. Alex becomes a sort of vigilante werewolf, targeting “bad boys,” many of whom seem connected to the Russian mob as well. After Terri and Marc learn about Alex, the three team up and work together to bring down their targets. Werkmeister’s story is engaging, with a couple of surprising twists, the biggest being the inclusion of lycanthropy in a police procedural (the refreshing premise is sufficiently rooted in realism to feel believable). The prose is accessible—not too descriptive, but rather spare and direct—and the story is well paced. The characters are enjoyable, though Alex is undeniably the most intriguing; fleshing out the other players a bit more would be appreciated, but Terri and Marc are still engaging, particularly in their moments of humor (“I am not going to be Dana Scully to your Fox fucking Mulder, all right?”). The glimpses into their personal lives further endear them to readers. The ending, though satisfying, feels a tad abrupt and underwhelming. Still, Werkmeister’s unique premise, paired with a tried-and-true crime drama, makes for an enjoyable mad-scientist formula.
A thrilling detective story with a sprinkling of werewolves—who could ask for more, really?Pub Date: Jan. 29, 2024
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 269
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Jan. 10, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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