An immensely likable sleuth headlines this lively crime tale.
In this third installment of a mystery series, an amateur Northern California detective searches for a missing person and stumbles on cyberespionage.
Trisha Carson leads a relatively quiet life working part time at the San Francisco Giants ballpark. But she’s solved two murders just in the last few years. So when Tyler Stockton, the adult grandson of her live-in landlord, Earl, seemingly vanishes, Trisha’s curiosity kicks into high gear. With a bit of snooping, she’s on to something much bigger than a missing person’s case. What that is specifically, she’s not exactly sure, but it involves a business heavily invested in cyberspying. There’s also a possible link to Earl, who flies and designs drones, which could put him, Trisha, and her dad, Robert, who lives with them as well, in peril. As Trisha digs for information on these cyberspies, she suspects a hacker has somehow bugged her house, made mysterious charges to her credit card, and nosed around on her computer and phone. As if this weren’t enough, Trisha seems to have a new admirer, Burk Dennison, a man who’s fine as “eye candy” but whose frequent run-ins with her eventually become contrived and stalker-ish. Carroll packs this installment with dynamic plot turns. While the enigmatic villains and their initially unclear objective complicate the story, everything makes sense by the end. Trisha’s intriguing personal life fuses well with her amateur investigation. For example, she only recently reconnected with Robert, who abandoned her and her younger sister, Lena, decades ago; this sparks brief but endearing scenes of Trisha and her father on the case together. Though her deductive skills, at least in this novel, rely too much on luck, Trisha proves far smarter and more prudent than the “danger junkie” she believes she is. The author’s pithy writing deftly blends technological jargon with relatable humor, such as the two sisters blaming each other for waking up Timmy, Lena’s 6-month-old son.
An immensely likable sleuth headlines this lively crime tale.Pub Date: Oct. 27, 2021
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Indies United Publishing House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Fast-moving excitement with a satisfying finish.
The feds must protect an accused criminal and an orphaned girl.
Maybe you’ve met him before as protagonist of The 6:20 Man (2022): Ex-Army Ranger Travis Devine, who’d had the dubious fortune to tangle with “the girl on the train,” is now assigned by his homeland security boss to protect Danny Glass, who's awaiting trial on multiple RICO charges in Washington state. Devine has what it takes: He “was a closer, snooper, fixer, investigator,” and, when necessary, a killer. These skills are on full display as the deaths of three key witnesses grind justice to a temporary halt. Glass has a 12-year-old niece, Betsy Odom, and each is the other’s only living relative—her parents recently died of an apparent drug overdose. The FBI has temporary guardianship of Betsy, who's a handful. She tells Travis that though she’s not yet 13, she's 28 in “life-shit years.” The financially well-heeled Glass wants to be her legal guardian with an eye to eventual adoption, but what are his real motives? And what happens to her if he's convicted? Meanwhile, Betsy insists that her parents never touched drugs, and she begs Travis to find out how they really died. This becomes part of a mission that oozes danger. The small town of Ricketts has a woman mayor who’s full of charm on the surface, but deeply corrupt and deadly when crossed. She may be linked to a subversive group called "12/24/65," as in 1865, when the Ku Klux Klan beast was born. Blood flows, bombs explode, and people perish, both good guys and not-so-good guys. Readers might ponder why in fiction as well as in life, it sometimes seems necessary for many to die so one may live. And what about the girl on the train? She's not necessary to the plot, but she's a fun addition as she pops in and out of the pages, occasionally leaving notes for Travis. Maybe she still wants him dead.
Fast-moving excitement with a satisfying finish.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2024
ISBN: 9781538757901
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
One of those rare triple-deckers that’s actually worth every page, every complication, every bead of sweat.
A routine break-in at the home of Sûreté homicide chief Armand Gamache leads slowly but surely to the revelation of a potentially calamitous threat to all Québec.
At first it seems as if nothing at all triggered the burglar alarm at Gamache’s home in Three Pines; it was literally a false alarm. It’s not till he receives a package containing his summer jacket that Gamache realizes someone really did get into his house, choosing to steal exactly this one item and return it with a cryptic note referring to “some malady…water” and “Angelica stems.” Having already refused to meet with Jeanne Caron, chief of staff to Marcus Lauzon, a powerful politician who’s already taken vengeance on Gamache and his family for not expunging his child’s criminal record, Gamache now agrees to meet with Charles Langlois, a marine biologist with ties to Caron who confesses to a leading role in stealing Gamache’s jacket. Their meeting ends inconclusively for Gamache, who’s convinced that Langlois is hiding something weighty, and all too conclusively for Langlois, who’s killed by a hit-and-run driver as he leaves. The news that Langlois had been investigating a water supply near the abbey of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups sends Gamache scurrying off to the abbey, where the plot steadily thickens until he’s led to ask how “an old recipe for Chartreuse” can possibly be connected to “a terrorist plot to poison Québec’s drinking water.” That’s a great question, and answering it will take the second half of this story, which spins ever more intricate connections among leading players that become deeply unsettling.
One of those rare triple-deckers that’s actually worth every page, every complication, every bead of sweat.Pub Date: Oct. 29, 2024
ISBN: 9781250328137
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Minotaur
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2024
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