A charming and suspenseful page-turner punctuated by dashes of the surreal.
A nerdy but swashbuckling reporter crisscrosses Florida to identify his college friend’s mysterious stalker in this second novel in Bruce’s thriller series.
Former Phoenix Daily Sun columnist Alexander Strange sets out with his papillon dog through the Deep South to spend some time on his Uncle Leo’s trawler, which is moored in Goodland, Florida. As a professional aficionado of all things bizarre, Alexander anticipates the Sunshine State will provide ample fodder for his “weird news reports.” Little does he know how odd his journey will become. His first peculiar encounter is with Madam Jazzabelle, a palm reader—or “Licensed Chirologist,” if you ask her—in New Orleans. After she foresees death in his hand, she abandons her practice and insists on accompanying Alexander on his journey. When the flirtatious Tess Winkler, Alexander’s old college flame who lives in Gainesville, reaches out to him, he agrees to help her uncover who’s been sending her threatening messages—although Amy Duffy, Tess’ spurned would-be lover and former roommate, is the prime suspect. The investigation eventually involves hush money, blackmail, abortion, and a conservative politician. The trio of self-appointed investigators are joined by Bristol Kreuger, a “full-on goth.” Together, they conclude that the disturbing messages correspond to physical locations on a “Weird Tour of Florida” that Tess once published. Bruce’s choice to structure the book as visits to these real-life sites, whose diversions range from the paranormal to the divine, is an amusing way to gain insight into the Southern state’s oddest nooks and crannies. Indeed, the situation comes to a head at The Devil’s Millhopper, described as “one of the largest sinkholes in Florida.” Overall, the book’s substance does not go much deeper than an average airport read. However, Alexander’s one-liners are certainly worthy of a chuckle, Bruce’s prose is consistently crisp and controlled, and the tension between the various characters is genuinely entertaining throughout.
A charming and suspenseful page-turner punctuated by dashes of the surreal.Pub Date: April 1, 2020
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Tropico Press
Review Posted Online: June 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2020
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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