A ghastly detective story and a macabre parable that should accommodate genre fans with a nightmare or two.
Macraven’s (Testament of the Dead, 2014, etc.) latest horror outing is a two-story collection that delves into the dark hearts of people whose depravity includes murder and black magic.
In the author’s first story, “Thoughts of a Killer,” Detective Merrick is after a serial killer who’s mutilating prostitutes. A crucifix in one of the bodies implies a religious angle, but that doesn’t help Merrick whittle down the suspect list. In the course of his investigation, he encounters an abundance of unpleasant individuals, some even with the capacity for murder, but no one, it seems, who’d debase the victims in such a manner. Merrick is a memorable protagonist, tormented and haunted by both the murdered women and his partner, Cody, who was killed in the line of duty and with whom Merrick has entire conversations when organizing his thoughts on the case. Readers won’t easily identify the killer, as Merrick interrogates numerous male and female suspects; even he is prone to shifting suspicions from one person to the next and sometimes back to the original person. Scenes with Harry, the morgue attendant, relaying details of the bodies to Merrick can be stomach-churning, but they’re never outright offensive. The much-shorter “Missing Jezebel” takes place in the 19th century. Grazel Goodwin hates her sister, Abigail, for getting all their parents’ attention. Grazel’s incestuous relationship with her uncle incurs her family’s ire, and she leaves in disgrace, hiding away in the mountains where she meets Ravel, a black witch. Years later, having dabbled in witchcraft, Grazel uses a spell to lure Abigail’s daughter, Jezebel, away from her mother in a twisted tale of misguided vengeance. Both stories have a feel of vintage horror; despite the former story’s contemporary setting, its murders in the streets and butchered victims recall Jack the Ripper’s rampage. Yet the tales are vastly different. Third-person descriptions of the murders in the first story are visceral and sometimes repulsive, while the latter’s narrative spans decades. The book does have its share of flubs, particularly misspellings and mishandled punctuation, which too often distract from the otherwise engaging storylines.
A ghastly detective story and a macabre parable that should accommodate genre fans with a nightmare or two.Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2014
ISBN: 978-1499082685
Page Count: 130
Publisher: Xlibris
Review Posted Online: Dec. 30, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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