Satire meets mystery in this entertaining update of Hitchcock and Agatha Christie.
When a passenger seems to disappear during a surreal train journey to Quebec, a group of strangers comes together to work out what happened in Barbé Hammer’s mystery.
Worlds collide in this novel set aboard a train headed across the United States to Quebec, bound for the titular city. Mack, a teacher-in-training and bagpipe musician of mixed Scottish/Salvadoran heritage, is on his way to a piping convention when he meets Allison, a no-nonsense goth girl who has twisted her ankle while on the train. While the two seem immediately at odds (Allison’s brusque personality rubs Mack the wrong way; he asks Allison if she fell “out of [her] black leather post-punk stroller” as a child), when Allison reports that the elderly man she befriended on board has vanished, Mack agrees to help her find him. They encounter a sweep of eclectic characters, including Jimmy, an Evangelical rodeo star; Joe, a former congressman and actor / Afghanistan vet / Princeton graduate; and a Chinese social media influencer documenting her trip across the United States. “We have not seen any guns” comically notes the culture-shocked influencer, who goes by May-Bel, in one of her vlogs. Despite Allison’s and Mack’s efforts, which include enlisting the help of the congressman and May-Bel, no one seems to be able to confirm that the old man even exists. Heavily referencing classic films and novels like Murder on the Orient Express and The Lady Vanishes, Barbé Hammer crafts a sly, satiric story that takes the tropes of a train-set whodunit and brings them into the 21st century, exploring themes of race and discrimination (one of the narrators is a Black female writer, who reflects on her position in society and in the narrative), psychology, and spirituality. While the characters’ introductions feel heavy-handed, and the author’s depictions of characters can be cliched—particularly in the case of the eye-liner-bedecked Allison—the author succeeds in delivering a fast-paced and deceptively complicated novel that balances suspense and social commentary. Some readers may find the novel’s quirks off-putting, but those who climb aboard will enjoy the winding journey.
Satire meets mystery in this entertaining update of Hitchcock and Agatha Christie.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2023
ISBN: 9798985069037
Page Count: 226
Publisher: Picture Show Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 16, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Uneven but fitfully amusing.
Betrayed by her husband, a severely depressed young woman gets drawn into the over-the-top festivities at a lavish wedding.
Phoebe Stone, who teaches English literature at a St. Louis college, is plotting her own demise. Her husband, Matt, has left her for another woman, and Phoebe is taking it hard. Indeed, she's determined just where and how she will end it all: at an oceanfront hotel in Newport, where she will lie on a king-sized canopy bed and take a bottle of her cat’s painkillers. At the hotel, Phoebe meets bride-to-be Lila, a headstrong rich girl presiding over her own extravagant six-day wedding celebration. Lila thought she had booked every room in the hotel, and learning of Phoebe's suicidal intentions, she forbids this stray guest from disrupting the nuptials: “No. You definitely can’t kill yourself. This is my wedding week.” After the punchy opening, a grim flashback to the meltdown of Phoebe's marriage temporarily darkens the mood, but things pick up when spoiled Lila interrupts Phoebe's preparations and sweeps her up in the wedding juggernaut. The slide from earnest drama to broad farce is somewhat jarring, but from this point on, Espach crafts an enjoyable—if overstuffed—comedy of manners. When the original maid of honor drops out, Phoebe is persuaded, against her better judgment, to take her place. There’s some fun to be had here: The wedding party—including groom-to-be Gary, a widower, and his 11-year-old daughter—takes surfing lessons; the women in the group have a session with a Sex Woman. But it all goes on too long, and the humor can seem forced, reaching a low point when someone has sex with the vintage wedding car (you don’t want to know the details). Later, when two characters have a meet-cute in a hot tub, readers will guess exactly how the marriage plot resolves.
Uneven but fitfully amusing.Pub Date: July 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781250899576
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
I Who Have Never Known Men ($22.00; May 1997; 224 pp.; 1-888363-43-6): In this futuristic fantasy (which is immediately reminiscent of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale), the nameless narrator passes from her adolescent captivity among women who are kept in underground cages following some unspecified global catastrophe, to a life as, apparently, the last woman on earth. The material is stretched thin, but Harpman's eye for detail and command of tone (effectively translated from the French original) give powerful credibility to her portrayal of a human tabula rasa gradually acquiring a fragmentary comprehension of the phenomena of life and loving, and a moving plangency to her muted cri de coeur (``I am the sterile offspring of a race about which I know nothing, not even whether it has become extinct'').
Pub Date: May 1, 1997
ISBN: 1-888363-43-6
Page Count: 224
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
