Over-the-top antics obstruct an otherwise engaging examination of desire and justice.
A young woman will stop at nothing to get what she wants in Carrasquillo’s twisted tale of love and murder.
Elyse Santiago is a beautiful young woman with a traumatic past. Having killed the man who sexually abused her by feeding him toxic sap from the manchineel plant when she was 12 years old, Elyse now shares her ongoing fascination with all things botanical with her devoted base of Instagram followers. Her best friend, Stella, whose abusive husband died of a heart attack and left her a wealthy widow, throws a house party and introduces her to Ben Deluca, a talent acquisition lawyer who sees showbiz stardom in Elyse’s future. The spark between them is immediate and undeniable, but there’s one thing standing in the way of a future together: Ana, Ben’s cruel wife. Ana’s wealthy father (who may remind readers of predatory movie exec Harvey Weinstein) also happens to be Ben’s boss; he finances the lavish lifestyle to which the unhappy couple have become accustomed. Every time Ben tries to leave their marriage for good, Ana threatens to ruin his life—or the lives of those he cares about. When Elyse decides to take matters into her own hands, she embraces her inner nature: “Nature is brutal, isn’t it? It’s impolite. It takes what it wants, and it doesn’t ask permission. Given the option to shrink or thrive, it will choose to thrive no matter the cost.” At first, everything seems to be going according to plan—Ben is made partner at his law firm, and Elyse wraps up loose ends from her past—until one major hiccup occurs that could derail the new life that Elyse is attempting to set up for herself and Ben.
Heavy-handed symbolism (present from the very first line) drives home the connection between Elyse and her beloved killer plants: “See this beauty? It may seem innocent, but this invasive species is a killer.” Whatever sympathy Elyse garners from her horrific childhood experiences with both sexual and physical abuse quickly evaporates when it becomes clear that her first instinct when faced with any sort of inconvenience is murder. Smooth dialogue and a brisk pace keep the action moving along nicely—there are many twists and turns packed into the narrative. The depictions of spousal physical abuse are quite graphic, and there is a trigger warning included at the beginning of the book. Carrasquillo’s choice to reverse the typical abusive gender dynamics within Ben’s marriage is a clever one that sheds light on an often ignored problem. Unfortunately, Ana tends to come across as more of a cartoon villain than a fully fleshed out person: “You don’t know what it means to have your life ruined yet. I haven’t even gotten started,” she heckles him from the edge of the bed. “You will pray for the piece of shit life you had before you met me.” Ben, meanwhile, bumbles along, trying to do the right thing…until he doesn’t. There is never much of a sense of “true love” between the lawyer and the murderer. Instead, readers are simply left with a sense that Ben better not upset Elyse—or she’s likely to resort to her favorite solution.
Over-the-top antics obstruct an otherwise engaging examination of desire and justice.Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2024
ISBN: 9798350931365
Page Count: 318
Publisher: BookBaby
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.
The sequel to It Ends With Us (2016) shows the aftermath of domestic violence through the eyes of a single mother.
Lily Bloom is still running a flower shop; her abusive ex-husband, Ryle Kincaid, is still a surgeon. But now they’re co-parenting a daughter, Emerson, who's almost a year old. Lily won’t send Emerson to her father’s house overnight until she’s old enough to talk—“So she can tell me if something happens”—but she doesn’t want to fight for full custody lest it become an expensive legal drama or, worse, a physical fight. When Lily runs into Atlas Corrigan, a childhood friend who also came from an abusive family, she hopes their friendship can blossom into love. (For new readers, their history unfolds in heartfelt diary entries that Lily addresses to Finding Nemo star Ellen DeGeneres as she considers how Atlas was a calming presence during her turbulent childhood.) Atlas, who is single and running a restaurant, feels the same way. But even though she’s divorced, Lily isn’t exactly free. Behind Ryle’s veneer of civility are his jealousy and resentment. Lily has to plan her dates carefully to avoid a confrontation. Meanwhile, Atlas’ mother returns with shocking news. In between, Lily and Atlas steal away for romantic moments that are even sweeter for their authenticity as Lily struggles with child care, breastfeeding, and running a business while trying to find time for herself.
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-668-00122-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.
Another sweltering month in Charlotte, another boatload of mysteries past and present for overworked, overstressed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.
A week after the night she chases but fails to catch a mysterious trespasser outside her town house, some unknown party texts Tempe four images of a corpse that looks as if it’s been chewed by wild hogs, because it has been. Showboat Medical Examiner Margot Heavner makes it clear that, breaking with her department’s earlier practice (The Bone Collection, 2016, etc.), she has no intention of calling in Tempe as a consultant and promptly identifies the faceless body herself as that of a young Asian man. Nettled by several errors in Heavner’s analysis, and even more by her willingness to share the gory details at a press conference, Tempe launches her own investigation, which is not so much off the books as against the books. Heavner isn’t exactly mollified when Tempe, aided by retired police detective Skinny Slidell and a host of experts, puts a name to the dead man. But the hints of other crimes Tempe’s identification uncovers, particularly crimes against children, spur her on to redouble her efforts despite the new M.E.’s splenetic outbursts. Before he died, it seems, Felix Vodyanov was linked to a passenger ferry that sank in 1994, an even earlier U.S. government project to research biological agents that could control human behavior, the hinky spiritual retreat Sparkling Waters, the dark web site DeepUnder, and the disappearances of at least four schoolchildren, two of whom have also turned up dead. And why on earth was Vodyanov carrying Tempe’s own contact information? The mounting evidence of ever more and ever worse skulduggery will pull Tempe deeper and deeper down what even she sees as a rabbit hole before she confronts a ringleader implicated in “Drugs. Fraud. Breaking and entering. Arson. Kidnapping. How does attempted murder sound?”
Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9821-3888-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
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