A disturbing, eerily timed novel but no page-turner.
As a lethal virus of unknown origin ravages huge swaths of the planet, legendary American disease fighter Henry Parsons heads up increasingly hopeless attempts to control it.
The easily transmitted disease, which literally turns its victims blue, is first detected in a refugee camp in Indonesia, "hothouse of diseases." Sent there by the World Health Organization, Parsons quickly recognizes the dangers at hand but not quickly enough to prevent his infected local driver from leaving the camp to join some 3 million worshipers on the annual hajj. When attempts at quarantines in Mecca fail and the infected pilgrims return home, they carry the disease all over the globe. In light of the relatively few disease-related deaths in Russia, suspicions arise that the virus was bioengineered by Putin. The Russian leader, of course, blames America, where cities and institutions begin crumbling. After blood drips from the eyes of the president, midspeech, and the vice president is infected, the ill-prepared government is driven into an underground facility in Virginia. (CNN's Anderson Cooper apparently perishes but not Wolf Blitzer, who still commands The Situation Room.) Featuring accounts of past plagues and pandemics, descriptions of pathogens and how they work, and dark notes about global warming, the book produces deep shudders. Wright, author of acclaimed nonfiction such as The Looming Tower (2006), about the Sept. 11 attacks, knows his way around geopolitical terror, but he's less successful as a thriller writer, upstaged here by the recent, real-life coronavirus. There is little true suspense in the novel, which sketches in its nightmarish scenarios rather than dramatizing them. Even a suicide bombing has marginal impact. Ultimately, the book gets caught up in family drama, sentimentality, and end-of-the-world moralizing. An atheist since his missionary parents were killed in an air crash, Parsons rediscovers religion.
A disturbing, eerily timed novel but no page-turner.Pub Date: May 12, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-525-65865-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
SEEN & HEARD
Starts with a bang and closes with a knockout punch of an ending.
A violent attack hijacks a woman’s memory in this novel of domestic suspense.
McFadden wastes no time pulling the trigger in this harrowing story that starts with gunfire then swiftly propels readers into a crack tale of secrets and misdirection. Originally self-published in 2016, the book carries the same formidable weight as McFadden’s later novels featuring unsuspecting women who lose their power then fight to recapture it—mostly from men who have betrayed them. That formula perfectly fits Dr. Charlotte McKenna, a 37-year-old dermatologist who isn’t looking for love until the most handsome man she’s ever seen begins to woo her. There are warning signs about Clark Douglas and Charlotte overlooks them to her detriment—but is he a killer? The novel has dual timelines split between events leading up to the day Charlotte barely survives a head wound meant to kill her and the months afterward, when she struggles to reclaim her memory and her mobility. In real life, McFadden is a physician trained to treat brain injuries. Her expertise gives Charlotte’s rehabilitation authenticity, and her writing talent makes it interesting and engaging. As good as that timeline is, readers will yearn to get back to the alternate timeline about who wants Charlotte dead. It’s only a matter of time before Charlotte starts to remember who tried to kill her, and the clock is ticking toward their next attempt. McFadden dishes up plenty of suspects: Charlotte’s secretive husband, Clark; a former patient turned stalker who confronts Charlotte on her honeymoon; and the angry husband of a patient who blames Charlotte for his wife leaving him. Though the story is delicious and dark, McFadden brightens things up with a possible love interest for Charlotte and a surprise ending sure to please the author’s many fans.
Starts with a bang and closes with a knockout punch of an ending.Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249617
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: July 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2026
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.
Dead bodies turn up in the first sentence of the prologue in McFadden’s latest domestic thriller.
The mystery of who died is at the pulsating heart of this propulsive tale. As Chapter 1 begins, Naomi arrives home to find the locks changed on the front door of the gorgeous home she shares with her husband, Jeremy, and their 5-year-old son, Teddy. Jeremy steps out the front door and convinces Naomi to move out while he has their home renovated, a plan Naomi knows nothing about. It’s all a ruse, though, as the next day Jeremy tells her he wants a divorce. Naomi is shellshocked and soon discovers that Jeremy is having an affair with Veronica, a beautiful younger woman. What seems at first like a stereotypical story about a man who leaves his wife turns into something else when Naomi decides she’ll do anything to get Veronica away from Jeremy and Teddy, and Veronica decides to fight for what she thinks she deserves. Fans of stalker novels will cringe with delight as creepy things start to happen. Teddy’s stuffed elephant, a gift from Veronica, is found impaled on a kitchen knife; Naomi suspects Jeremy is gaslighting her and that Veronica tried to poison her. A weird confrontation among Jeremy, Veronica, and Naomi at Teddy’s birthday party, to which Naomi shows up uninvited, is priceless. There are three main characters, and any or all of them may be unreliable narrators. Packing the plot with dark, gasp-inducing twists, McFadden outdoes herself in a story about how highly emotional people engage in risky behavior to get what they want—but in this novel, for better or worse, not everyone will survive.
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249631
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK TO SCREEN
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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