A riveting tale of impressive siblings battling oppression.
Two sisters in the early 20th century brave cruel men and a loathsome religious commune in this debut novel.
Genesis and Isaiah live on a family ranch situated somewhere in a mountainous region. The girls aren’t regular churchgoers, and only their devout mother takes a shine to their small town’s new preacher, Leader. She even follows him when he moves his church to a “village” of cabins called the Community. The sisters stay with their father and their grandmother, but their mom eventually comes back for them. The Community proves to be a wretched place. Leader beds nearly every female member while his congregation routinely condemns women as “harlots.” He’s clearly priming Genesis even though she is barely a teen. Although the sisters escape and return to the ranch, they struggle with truly leaving the vile commune behind. Isaiah finds herself stuck in a dangerous love-hate relationship with Leader’s son. As the years pass, the sisters run into their share of domineering and threatening men, not all of whom belong to the Community. Genesis and Isaiah can handle themselves when confrontations turn physical, which happens far too often. Galloway’s grim tale builds an intriguing history, covering more than 15 years. The girls’ grandfather, for example, was a notorious outlaw who used pilfered money to buy the ranch. Much of the gripping story feels ominous, with the Community’s black cloud constantly hovering. Similarly, Isaiah senses people’s impending deaths, an apparent ability that the author incorporates with deft subtlety. In addition, the prose highlighting the sisters’ alternating first-person narratives resonates. At one point, Genesis muses: “Breaths in steaming bursts, bones grinding on wood. Flesh and hot, sleek skin. I felt unlocked and unburdened, something in me set free.” Despite the gloom throughout, hope continuously sparkles, as Genesis and Isaiah’s bond seems unbreakable, even when they fight and one sister welcomes romance into her life.
A riveting tale of impressive siblings battling oppression.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-955062-60-2
Page Count: 270
Publisher: RIZE Press
Review Posted Online: April 8, 2022
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
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
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