Violence and love go hand in hand in this tale of two rough men seeking vengeance for their murdered sons.
A lean, mean crime story about two bereaved fathers getting their hands bloody.
Coming from the right author, genre fiction has a rare capacity to touch on any number of big ideas: love, death, hatred, violence, freedom, bondage, and redemption, to name just a few. Cosby's latest fits the bill. Fast on its feet, by turns lethal and tender, the story takes place in small-town Virginia, though it could be the backwoods of a great many places. Ike Randolph and Buddy Lee Jenkins, both ex-cons haunted by their pasts, wouldn’t ordinarily mix, largely because Ike is Black and Buddy Lee is White and a casual racist. But the two men are tragically linked. Their sons were married to each other, and they were murdered together, shot in their faces outside a fancy Richmond wine store on their anniversary. The dads are both homophobes, but they also love their sons, so when the police investigation quickly stalls, Ike and Buddy Lee decide to crack a few skulls on their own. Cosby gives us both the charge of once-bad men getting back in touch with their wild sides and the sad reluctance of relatively straight-and-narrow lives turning to vengeance. These old-timers have done bad, bad things, and they’ve done the time to prove it. Now they’re ready to do those things again in the name of a thorny father-son love that neither man is quite comfortable with. Here’s Buddy Lee after a long, hard night with his new friend: “Chopping up your first body is disgusting. Your second is tiresome. When you’re doing your fifteenth it’s all muscle memory.” This is a bloody good yarn with two compelling antiheroes you’ll root for from the start, and not only because their enemies, or at least some of them, belong to a White nationalist biker club with murderous ways of its own. Lean and mean, this is crime fiction with a chip on its shoulder.
Violence and love go hand in hand in this tale of two rough men seeking vengeance for their murdered sons.Pub Date: July 6, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-25270-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
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
A moving, realistic look at one woman’s post-divorce family life that manages to be both poignant and funny.
A recently divorced writer juggles a chaotic full house, a struggling career, and a confusing romantic life.
Lila Kennedy thought she had the perfect family—a loving mother, a doting stepfather, two wonderful daughters, and a great husband. She even wrote a self-help book about repairing a marriage, which was published a mere two weeks before her husband left her. After her own mother’s sudden death, Lila finds herself an unexpected single mom with her health-nut stepfather, Bill, for a roommate. When her long-absent actor father, Gene, moves in, things go from crowded to chaotic. When Gene isn’t talking about his memories of starring on a Star Trek–like television show, he’s starting fights with Bill. Perhaps the worst part is that Lila’s supposed to produce a new book about the unexpected direction her life has taken. She quickly finds that writing about her real-life romantic exploits (including the kind gardener Bill hired and the sexy single dad she lusts after at school pick-up) and the actual heartbreak that upended her family is easier said than done. Moyes creates a world that is believable and funny. It’s hilarious to read about the distinct characters in Lila’s life—such as her lentil-loving stepfather and egocentric biological father—interacting with each other. There’s plenty of drama here, but none of it feels forced. It all comes from flawed people doing their best to coexist and making plenty of mistakes along the way. Moyes combines the warmth of an Annabel Monaghan rom-com with the humanity of a Catherine Newman novel, creating a story that will provoke tears and laughter.
A moving, realistic look at one woman’s post-divorce family life that manages to be both poignant and funny.Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2025
ISBN: 9781984879325
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: Nov. 9, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
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