Krentz never disappoints, and this one hits the sweet spot.
When Jack Lancaster’s mortal enemy goes after his neighbor Winter Meadows, hoping to frame him for her murder, the cold-case specialist takes the opportunity to follow the scant clues and, with his family’s and Winter’s help, force a confrontation.
Jack Lancaster’s mother was killed in the cult fire set by Quinton Zane when Jack was 12, and since then he’s become a professor, writer, and consultant on the criminal mind, with an expertise in solving cold cases. When he rents a cottage in Eclipse Bay on the Oregon coast, he meets his neighbor Winter, a hypnotist who’s started her own business as a meditation instructor. Jack finds her skills beneficial in helping him control the lucid dreams that he uses in his investigations, dreams that have recently become more unruly, a situation that he thinks may be connected to Quinton Zane. When he saves Winter from an attack by a "former-client-turned-stalker," he is convinced that Zane is somehow behind the event and takes the matter to his family: two other victims of the cult fire and the man who saved and then fostered them. At first skeptical, they begin to believe they might actually bring Zane down if they stay under the radar and let him weave a web meant to catch them. Meanwhile, keeping Winter safe and by his side manifests a relationship Jack had hoped for, but if Zane has his way, no one Jack cares about will survive. Luckily Jack and his brothers are a few steps ahead and ready to bring Zane down for good. Krentz rounds out her Quinton Zane series with a couple to root for, a tiny hint of the supernatural, a page-burning plot, a vanquished villain (of course!), a sexy, heart-warming romance, and a quick series check-in and wrap-up.
Krentz never disappoints, and this one hits the sweet spot.Pub Date: Jan. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-399-58529-6
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Nov. 12, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.
Another reboot of Jane Austen?!? Hadlow pulls it off in a smart, heartfelt novel devoted to bookish Mary, middle of the five sisters in Pride and Prejudice.
Part 1 recaps Pride and Prejudice through Mary’s eyes, climaxing with the humiliating moment when she sings poorly at a party and older sister Elizabeth goads their father to cut her off in front of everyone. The sisters’ friend Charlotte, who marries the unctuous Mr. Collins after Elizabeth rejects him, emerges as a pivotal character; her conversations with Mary are even tougher-minded here than those with Elizabeth depicted by Austen. In Part 2, two years later, Mary observes on a visit that Charlotte is deferential but remote with her husband; she forms an intellectual friendship with the neglected and surprisingly nice Mr. Collins that leads to Charlotte’s asking Mary to leave. In Part 3, Mary finds refuge in London with her kindly aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner. Mrs. Gardiner is the second motherly woman, after Longbourn housekeeper Mrs. Hill, to try to undo the psychic damage wrought by Mary’s actual mother, shallow, status-obsessed Mrs. Bennet, by building up her confidence and buying her some nice clothes (funded by guilt-ridden Lizzy). Sure enough, two suitors appear: Tom Hayward, a poetry-loving lawyer who relishes Mary’s intellect but urges her to also express her feelings; and William Ryder, charming but feckless inheritor of a large fortune, whom naturally Mrs. Bennet loudly favors. It takes some maneuvering to orchestrate the estrangement of Mary and Tom, so clearly right for each other, but debut novelist Hadlow manages it with aplomb in a bravura passage describing a walking tour of the Lake District rife with seething complications furthered by odious Caroline Bingley. Her comeuppance at Mary’s hands marks the welcome final step in our heroine’s transformation from a self-doubting wallflower to a vibrant, self-assured woman who deserves her happy ending. Hadlow traces that progression with sensitivity, emotional clarity, and a quiet edge of social criticism Austen would have relished.
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-12941-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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