Bruen's plotting has improved since The Hackman Blues (1998). But this second volume in a proposed trilogy (A White Arrest,...
For the moment, the bad guys are having it all their way. Sean and Josie knife Det. Sgt. Brant in the back before hotfooting it to Noo Yawk; Roy ``The Alien'' Fenton, just out of prison, on hire from southend London master criminal Bill, trashes Brant's flat, destroys his collection of Ed McBain novels, and scares the bejesus out of him with a teakettle of scalding water. When Sean is killed while attempting a mugging, Brant is dispatched to America to extradite Josie, little knowing that The Alien is now a continent away in San Francisco preparing to murder his former girlfriend and her new husband before taking a well-earned Mexico sabbatical. Back in London, Brant's protégé Falls, newly pregnant but still tyreiron tough, is hospitalized after being waylaid in a snooker hall, and Brant’s chief inspector, Roberts, can't find anyone who’ll let him whine for a moment about his skin cancer. And let's not forget Bill the mastermind, who sends an overeager shooter called Collie to the airport to greet Brant on his return, with fatal results when Collie mistakes Josie for Brant's girlfriend.
Bruen's plotting has improved since The Hackman Blues (1998). But this second volume in a proposed trilogy (A White Arrest, not reviewed) still quotes popculture icons and offers cute little lists (``Things to look for in a potential hit man: 1. Patience. 2. Cool. 3. Absolute ruthlessness'') in a hopeless attempt to update a noir attitude sealed in 50-year-old amber.Pub Date: April 17, 2000
ISBN: 1-899344-49-7
Page Count: 158
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2000
IN THE NEWS
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
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