A captivating story of a woman who untangles mysteries and comes to know the importance of self-worth.
In Teukolsky’s novel, a woman’s life is turned upside down in the wake of her husband’s death when she is approached with a shocking invitation to continue his secret work as a spy.
When readers first meet Madeline Geiger, she is plummeting through the sky. After a desperate, ultimately futile, attempt to save her husband Mike while skydiving, she is left with broken bones and a broken heart. What’s even worse is that Mike’s death is deemed suspicious: An FAA safety inspector reports that Mike’s parachute was tampered with. After a short interview with a detective reveals Madeline’s resentment over their professional relationship—Mike’s prestige as a computer science professor always outshone hers as his research assistant—she seems to become a person of interest in her husband’s death. Things are not quite so simple, though; Madeline is approached at Mike’s funeral by FBI agent Joe Shelmann, who explains that, allegedly, someone in her husband’s department at the university is providing encryption software to illegal pornographers, and Mike was the FBI’s informant. Joe has come with a proposition for Madeline to take over Mike’s work to see the case through. She initially refuses, but her relationship with her workplace and colleagues continues to sour, and she discovers that her husband had been stealing her research, so she decides to take the job on—with all of its risks—not only for justice, but also for her own satisfaction. Teukolsky has built this story in such a way that as Madeline becomes more invested in uncovering the truth and advocating for herself, so too does the reader. The author introduces a cast of characters fit for a proper mystery—Madeline’s coworkers are rendered suspicious by their behavior with her (“Do you think for a moment anyone here will take you seriously?” asks the department head). Teukolsky does an incredible job of interweaving Madeline’s personal story with the investigation, finding multiple ways to engage readers. This novel is a great fit for anyone seeking an unconventional take on the spy story—one seasoned with self-discovery and personal growth along with the usual excitement and intrigue.
A captivating story of a woman who untangles mysteries and comes to know the importance of self-worth.Pub Date: March 21, 2025
ISBN: 9781967036004
Page Count: 336
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: March 31, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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