A character study of pedestrian evil in the Wegmans-and-Peloton class, fascinating in its heartlessness.
Prom Mom and Cad Dad reunite decades after the tabloid crime that blew up their lives.
Amber Glass was never Joe Simpson's girlfriend; she was his tutor in high school, and though he was having sex with her, he would not have been going to the prom with her if his main squeeze hadn't dumped him. She hid her pregnancy until prom night, when she gave birth in a hotel bathroom to a 28-week-old preemie, whom she served time in a juvenile facility for murdering. Decades later, she moves back to their shared hometown of Baltimore and opens an outsider art gallery with her notorious name on the marquee. When they reconnect, as was her intention, Joe is adding her to a full dance card: He's married to his college girlfriend, the beautiful Meredith, now a successful plastic surgeon, and he's sleeping with Jordan Altman, a younger real estate agent from his company. What a mess for poor Joe, who is also hit with major financial troubles when the pandemic spoils his plans to flip an unpromising suburban shopping center. Except, who cares about Joe? Lippman seems to have purposely given the reader no one to root for in this unusual psychological suspense novel in which no crimes are committed or revealed until the final pages. All the characters are described as physically attractive but are unappealing otherwise; the relationships of the three female characters to the soulless, creepy, narcissistic Joe are inexplicable. This gives the book a coldblooded quality, a refusal to sentimentalize victims or to make bad actors into romantic antiheroes. As usual, Lippman creates a convincing portrait of a particular sector of Baltimore, this time well-heeled professionals in the northern part of town, and adds New Orleans to the mix as well, with a king cake and a side order of red beans working as plot points.
A character study of pedestrian evil in the Wegmans-and-Peloton class, fascinating in its heartlessness.Pub Date: July 25, 2023
ISBN: 9780062998064
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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