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Book Review: BLUE MONDAY by Nicci French

This review originally ran in Shelf Awareness for Readers, and is reprinted here with permission.

Nicci French’s Blue Monday is the first novel in a new suspense series featuring Frieda Klein, an insomniac London psychologist who does her best thinking while taking long walks through city streets at night. She has a lot on her mind, including a patient named Alan Dekker who tells her he desperately wants a child—right before five-year-old Matthew Farraday goes missing from a local school. Alan wants a son who looks like him, with red hair and freckles—attributes Matthew happens to have.

Frieda takes her suspicions to the lead inspector in the case, and together they uncover perplexing similarities to the unsolved disappearance of a little girl twenty-two years earlier. How much truth is contained in Alan’s desires and dreams? Should Frieda betray her patient to try to bring Matthew home?

Frieda makes a couple of leaps in reasoning that require suspension of disbelief, but the inner workings of the mind are mysterious, so anything is possible. The authors (“Nicci French” is a pseudonym for husband and wife Sean French and Nicci Gerrard) write in a cool, understated style befitting a protagonist who keeps her emotions at bay, and it works well for the story. Their restraint is helpful; the reader doesn’t need all the horrific details of a child in jeopardy spelled out. But the story still manages to resonate, especially in its depictions of the families of the abducted children—the lack of closure tears them apart to the point their souls go missing, too. The dark ending also delivers a gut punch, taking Blue Monday a shade closer to black.

Nerd verdict: Mesmerizing Monday

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Book Review: STARTERS by Lissa Price

This review is by my YA contributor, Mena Dolinh (aka my niece), 10, who’s no slouch in her pop culture knowledge.—PCN

This book is about a sixteen-year-old girl named Callie who decides to become a starter. Starters are teens who rent their bodies to rich old people, but Callie wakes up during her rental and finds out that the renter is planning to commit murder while being inside her body.

I think this book can appeal to kids and adults alike but the concept of renting bodies is kind of creepy. Besides the fact that all my friends wanted to read Starters when I had it on my desk in class since they knew it was an advance copy, I think young adults in general will be attracted to this book because it’s filled with fighting and action, like in the Percy Jackson and The Hunger Games books. It keeps Starters fast-moving and not sappy like Judy Blume books that can appeal only to girls. Adults can enjoy this, too, because it has lots of gadgets. The evil guy in the book is called the Old Man, and he wears an electronic mask that keeps flashing a series of different computer-generated faces, like a character in the episode of Doctor Who called “The Idiot’s Lantern.”

While I like the idea of renting bodies because it’s kind of dark, in general the concept of the book is not entirely new. I can find many similarities in The Hunger Games and [Scott Westerfeld’s] Uglies. For example, in Hunger Games, Katniss lives off her hunting to support her mom and her sister, Prim. In Starters, Callie supports her brother, Tyler, from her high-paying job as a starter. In Uglies, Tally, the main character, gets an operation that all teens get when they turn sixteen to make them pretty. After the operation, everyone lives in New Pretty Town where they spend their life partying. In Starters, the same thing happens when Callie has to get a complete makeover so the renters can go and have fun.

The concept also doesn’t really make sense. Renting bodies would take a while to get approved [by the government], and if you do it illegally, it’d be hard to keep it a secret and would cost a fortune since you have to make over all the dirty kids. And it would be really hard to keep teenagers looking perfect all the time because their bodies are still changing.

I wish the author had gone into more depth with the characters because when a character is introduced, it’s not detailed enough for me to really picture him or her in my head. Callie is a tough girl who knows how to fight and use a gun and is always being chased by the bad guys, but I don’t know if she has blond or brown hair or what color her skin is. Another example is Callie’s close friend Michael. He’s introduced as a friend who stays with Callie and Tyler. He helps Callie find shelter while they are on the run but the author never describes what he looks like or what his backstory is.

This is the first book out of two [Ed. note: Enders, the sequel, will be published in December] so the ending is a cliffhanger. It’s a little predictable because Callie keeps making references to and having flashbacks about someone, but overall the book is a page turner.

Buy Starters from Amazon| Buy it from an indie bookstore

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On the Road with Hilary Davidson

Award-winning author Hilary Davidson‘s second crime novel, The Next One to Fall, was released on Valentine’s Day to ecstatic reviews, such as the one from Publishers Weekly, which said, “Davidson’s exciting follow-up to her debut, 2010’s The Damage Done, takes travel journalist Lily Moore, who’s still reeling from her sister’s death in The Damage Done, to Peru…The rich history and geography of Peru add depth to an engrossing mystery that constantly keeps the reader guessing.” The book also received glowing notices from Jen’s Book Thoughts, The Maine Suspect, and Book Reviews by Elizabeth White, among many other publications.

Hilary has begun her World Domination Tour to promote it, and since she’s also a travel writer, I thought I’d ask her to do a travelogue. The idea was for me to text/tweet her at random times, asking her where she is, who she’s with, what she’s doing, etc., and have her take a candid snapshot at that moment to capture her experiences on the road. Not only did Hilary allow me to intrude upon her travels this way, she took the initiative and snapped photos for me even when I couldn’t reach her in pockets with bad cell/Internet reception.

Hilary’s back on the road today, with an event at Book Revue in Long Island, so I thought this would be a good time to present a glimpse of her life on tour. (Note: All times are local to Hilary’s locations.)

Hilary Davidson: When I checked into Houston’s Hotel ZaZa at midnight on Thursday night, there was some confusion. My first room was a themed room, known as the “Hard Times” room; this skull was on the wall. A few minutes after I got there, the front desk called up and said they had to move me; the people at the front desk were deeply upset at the thought of me being stuck in this room. I told them I was a crime writer, but they insisted on moving me to a swanky room with…

HD: George Clooney on the bathroom wall??? I liked the skull better, actually.

Pop Culture Nerd (Friday, Feb. 17, 2:42 p.m.): Hi Hilary, where are you right now?

HD: Grey Houston, pounded by rain. Wondering if anyone will show up at the event tonight!

PCN: I’m betting they’ll show. Everyone showing up wet will just make your signing more fun!

As I predicted, people did come, and Hilary had a surreal moment when she saw herself on Crimespree magazine’s cover for the first time at Murder by the Book.

Next up on Saturday was…

HD: BookPeople in Austin. Um, wow.

Then it’s on to…

HD: Austin’s Broken Spoke on Saturday night after my event, listening to a band called The Derailers.

It’s on to Scottsdale, AZ, but first…

HD: I love Ray Benson of Asleep at the Wheel—and here he is at the Austin airport!

PCN (Tues., Feb. 21, 3:38 p.m.): Where are you? What are you doing? Where were you last night at 11 p.m.?

HD: Right now I’m working on a Peru slideshow for the Poisoned Pen (yes, for tonight—eeep). Last night at 11? In my room, on phone with Dan! [This is] my suite at Scottsdale’s Hotel Valley Ho.

PCN (Tues., Feb. 21, 9:16 p.m.): Where are you? Anyone you know show up at your signing?

HD (Tues., Feb. 21, 11:02 p.m.): Hey, I’m back! Tonight was AWESOME. Lots of friends turned out: Keith Rawson, Jason Duke, Lesa Holstine, Chantelle Aimee Osman, also my gluten-free friend Liisa Perry. Also huge crowd of strangers. Store had to get more chairs! Afterwards, Liisa & I went for dinner at a restaurant called Citizen Public House (that’s why I didn’t see your message until now). Oh, Rhys Bowen was there tonight, too! Very excited to meet her!

With Patrick, Keith, and Jason

PCN (Weds., Feb. 22, 9:09 a.m.): What are you eating/drinking/reading right now?

HD: Right now I’m packing because I have to check out of the hotel before my event at Lesa Holstine’s library!

PCN (Weds., Feb. 22, 1:22 p.m.): What are you doing to prepare for your appearance? [Her event was starting in about half an hour.]

HC: Hmm. I drove to the library with Lesa (I love her!). Does that count as event prep? Seriously, what do authors do to prep for an event?

PCN: Different things I’ve heard: have a drink, nap, go for a run/to the gym, put clothes on.

HD: Had dinner at the Hotel Valley Ho’s restaurant just before my flight home. “Table for one, please,” is never fun to say, but I had a great meal and the restaurant staff was terrific. Looking forward to going back!

Thank you so much, Hilary, for sharing your travels with us, and letting me bug you along the way. Readers, I hope you all have enjoyed being on the road with her. She’s doing it so she can meet you in person so check out Hilary’s upcoming events and go see her!

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Book Giveaway: THE DARLINGS by Cristina Alger

Thanks to Lindsay at Pamela Dorman/Penguin, I get to give away one copy of Cristina Alger’s timely new novel, The Darlings (I’m still reading it so a review will come later). Here’s the description from the author’s website:

A sophisticated page-turner about a wealthy New York family embroiled in a financial scandal with cataclysmic consequences.

Now that he’s married to Merrill Darling, daughter of billionaire financier Carter Darling, attorney Paul Ross has grown accustomed to New York society and all of its luxuries: a Park Avenue apartment, weekends in the Hamptons, bespoke suits. When Paul loses his job, Carter offers him the chance to head the legal team at his hedge fund. Thrilled with his good fortune in the midst of the worst financial downturn since the Great Depression, Paul accepts the position.

But Paul’s luck is about to shift: a tragic event catapults the Darling family into the media spotlight, a regulatory investigation, and a red-hot scandal with enormous implications for everyone involved. Suddenly, Paul must decide where his loyalties lie—will he save himself while betraying his wife and in-laws or protect the family business at all costs?

Cristina Alger’s glittering debut novel interweaves the narratives of the Darling family, two eager SEC attorneys, and a team of journalists all racing to uncover—or cover up—the truth. With echoes of a fictional Too Big to Fail and the novels of Dominick Dunne, The Darlings offers an irresistible glimpse into the highest echelons of New York society—a world seldom seen by outsiders—and a fast-paced thriller of epic proportions.

The book has received positive reviews from Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal, among other publications. For more info on Alger, visit her website, where you can also read an excerpt.

If the novel sounds like it’s right up your alley, enter for a chance to win it by leaving a comment about a fake scandal from your past. Or it could be real—I won’t know. Just make it juicy!

Giveaway is open to US/Canada residents only, and ends next Tuesday, February 28, at 5 p.m. PST. One winner will be randomly chosen and have 48 hours to claim the book. Now let’s have you “leak” some scandalous details!

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Book Review: ALI IN WONDERLAND by Ali Wentworth

Ali Wentworth, also known as the actress /comedienne/Oprah correspondent Alexandra Wentworth, adds author to her resume with a collection of stories about growing up in D.C. as the daughter of a journalist father and mother who was White House social secretary during the Reagan years. She also tells about her experiences at prep school, auditioning for her breakthrough gig on the sketch show In Living Color (Seinfeld fans might know her as Schmoopie from the Soup Nazi episode), and meeting and marrying her husband, George Stephanopoulos.

Despite her privileged upbringing (Henry Kissinger came to one of her mother’s parties), Wentworth manages to make her stories accessible, with a breezy style and some very funny moments. When she was twelve, her older sister Sissy decided she’d run away because she was bored out of her mind from being laid up at home after spinal fusion surgery. Instead of stopping her, their mother said to Wentworth:

“Please run away with your sister! I don’t want her out there alone!”

“But I don’t want to run away!”

“I’m asking you nicely, now go!”

I was getting irritated. “I don’t want to run away, Mom! I want to stay home! I’m happy!”

She also recounts what happened to one of her nannies:

Julia was our Mary Poppins, until one day she turned in her resignation. Marrying a successful financial adviser, not the chimney sweep. And she was off to have babies she wouldn’t be paid to love.

But while the anecdotes are witty, they often just peter out without going anywhere. Several stories end in ellipses or a question, making it seem as if even she wasn’t sure where she was going with them. I couldn’t help but think of Tina Fey’s Bossypants, in which the essays are wacky but when you get to the end of each one, the reason why Fey chose to relate that particular experience becomes clear, e.g. the rules of improv she learned at Second City can also apply to life. It’s okay to just be entertaining without making a point about something, but stories are more memorable when they can be taken at more than face value.

Nerd verdict: Lightweight Ali

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Book Review: NIGHT ROUNDS by Helene Tursten

Despite the title and the fact much of this novel concerns nocturnal activities, I wouldn’t recommend reading Helene Tursten’s Night Rounds (Soho Crime, Feb. 14) at night if you’re afraid of ghosts. As I went along, I wasn’t sure if I was imagining noises and things in the dark, just like the characters do in the book. Or do they?

One night the power goes out at an old rundown hospital in Göteborg, Sweden. During the blackout, a surgical patient dies when the machinery stops working, a nurse is found murdered, and another goes missing. A witness is adamant that she saw the murderer—a former employee named Nurse Tekla. Problem is, Nurse Tekla has been dead for sixty years, though legend has her haunting the hospital because she committed suicide there. Is there a ghost on the grounds? What does it have to do with the very real bodies that start piling up? Detective Inspector Irene Huss returns in this series’ second installment to investigate, and discovers that the recent killings are somehow connected to the hospital’s troubled history. And while most things aren’t as they seem, the truth could also be exactly what you think it is.

The novel was translated from its original Swedish version by Laura A. Wideburg, and contains some of the odd syntax I’ve come to expect from translations of Scandinavian mysteries. But this doesn’t detract too much from a solid police procedural with an undercurrent of creepiness. DI Huss, a third dan black belt in jujitsu and married mother of two teen girls, is an appealing character who keeps her head in tense situations, and makes witty observations about herself and the people she encounters in her investigation.

For example, she meets a witness who has a sallow complexion and a penchant for beige clothing. As they turn toward automatic doors to enter a building, “Irene imagined that the sensor wouldn’t react to such a colorless woman and the doors wouldn’t open.” After meeting the gorgeous young wife of the hospital’s head doctor, Irene briefly considers getting a facelift before deciding it’s “[n]ot a good look for a criminal inspector. You probably shouldn’t go around with a face that said, ‘Really? You don’t say!’ every time you visit the scene of a crime or bring a suspect in for questioning.”

Tursten also issues harsh words against government systems that allow mentally ill homeless people to fall through the cracks, she exposes the misogynism that exists on the police force, and condemns zealots who resort to violence to support a cause (veganism, in this case). The Scandinavian crime novels I’ve read often seem to include this kind of social commentary, which gets woven into the plot in such a way that doesn’t make it feel too didactic. Bottom line, this is an engrossing whodunit that kept me up late into the night, leaving a chill on my skin as if touched by a ghost.

Nerd verdict: Night chills

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Book Review: DRIFTING HOUSE by Krys Lee

This review is by contributor Thuy Dinh, editor of the literary webzine Da Mau.

With nine cinematic, well-crafted stories, Krys Lee’s debut collection literally takes your breath away in its unflinching portrayal of displacement. Almost all the stories in Drifting House illustrate the horrific but rarely redemptive struggle toward love. Her characters, while longing for change, are ultimately doomed because they cannot escape their preordained sense of self. In this way they become “drifting houses”—unmoored, hermetic vessels that travel through languages, cultures, space, and time but never “arrive” anywhere.

Believing that people “carry their history with them,” and that history is not “just a family’s history but the history and culture of a nation,” Lee uses her writing to explore many paradoxical facets of the uprooted self. Born in South Korea, resettled in California, educated in Washington State and England, and now living in South Korea but active in resettlement efforts involving North Korean defectors, the author relentlessly navigates the porous yet alienating borders between America and Asia, North and South, reality and myth, freedom and incarceration.

Lee’s fractured, volatile characters provide the cataclysm for her richly layered fiction. Their tragic flaws denounce all established notions of infallibility. Fatalistic but afraid, Lee’s fugitives rarely trust their instinct. Tragedy ensues when these characters succumb to the illusion of order. In “At The Edge of the World,” a family is nearly torn apart when the wife, a devout Christian, refuses to acknowledge her husband’s deep yearning for his dead brother and his desperate resort to shamanism. In “The Goose Father,” a married accountant is troubled by strong feelings toward his tenant, a younger male named Wuseong with “anxious rosebud lips” who owns a mangy goose that may or may not embody his mother’s reincarnated soul.

In the rare instances when characters reject their predetermined roles, they are still left with a sense of profound loss akin to death or exile, because their former selves are intrinsically tied to their society and families. The snow-covered landscape in “Drifting House” is an apt metaphor. The children who flee the North Korean famine in the story face the harsh skyline of China and intuit “the dim sense that the world outstretched before them would never know or care about them.” In “The Salaryman,” the main character—a homeless man after losing his job—uses a pair of metal chopsticks to defend himself against thugs. Survival liberates him from illusions, and at the same time deprives him of civilization.

In Lee’s world, love becomes terror because it resists all man-made boundaries. The author skillfully applies magical realism in a few stories to depict the deathless bonds of love. In its best incarnation, love—like Wuseong’s deep attachment to his goose—reflects a childlike openness to mysteries. To reach this level of transcendence, acceptance of imperfection is a requisite step. In “A Small Sorrow”—my favorite story in the collection—Eunkang, an androgynous painter with “boy’s hips and nipples like wild berries,” finally comes to terms with her spiritual and sexual hunger. Eunkang’s realization of her husband as a vain, weak man does not diminish her love for him, because she now sees him, and herself, fully. Eunkang’s embrace of her condition gives a luminous cast over Drifting House. Even in her darkest, most startling depictions, Lee is full of grace.

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Book Review: DEFENDING JACOB by William Landay

I originally reviewed this for Shelf Awareness. It’s reprinted here with permission.

When Assistant D.A. Andy Barber gets a case involving a murdered boy who’s a classmate of his son’s, there are gripes about conflict of interest. Then evidence points to Andy’s son, Jacob, being the murderer, and the D.A. takes Andy off the case. He finds himself on the defensive side of the law trying to prove Jacob’s innocence. But the more he investigates, the more he realizes there’s a lot about his son he doesn’t know, including whether or not Jacob is capable of murder.

This novel is a combination legal and psychological thriller, and keeps readers guessing about what happened to the murdered boy and the true nature of Jacob’s psyche. But the central characters are hard to root for. Jacob remains an enigma, seen differently through Andy’s eyes and those of his mother, Laurie. Andy believes his son cannot commit murder, going so far as to destroy potential evidence. Laurie, however, immediately questions whether she and Andy had been good parents, if Jacob had needed help that they never provided. These may be realistic reactions, but they make Laurie somewhat hard to like, as if she’s being disloyal to her son by assuming the worst so quickly.

Landay’s overall style could use some editing—he repeatedly mentions Laurie’s weight loss during the ordeal, and takes half a page to describe idyllic beach scenes on a resort’s website. And the so-called shock ending was somewhat spoiled by promotional materials comparing this to a very well-known legal thriller (if you’ve read it, you can guess the twist here). But the story does have its merits, raising questions about how well we know those we love, and how far we would go to protect them, even from themselves.

Nerd verdict: Overly written, but has its merits

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In Search of a Good Character Name

I recently read three crime novels in which the character names were so over the top that they kept distracting me from the story. I couldn’t focus every time the ridiculous monikers came up because I was either rolling my eyes or snickering. And these were the leads! Instead of continuing to read, I started thinking about what makes a good character name and this post was born.

I’m guessing that the overly dramatic names are meant to make the characters unique. I understand they should be something that if you look in the White Pages (if you still use such a thing), you shouldn’t see eight of them, like you might with a Bill Johnson or Ann Martin. I also get that, say, Larry Brown, may not be sexy enough for a protagonist who’s a spy or former SEAL, and Judy Anderson may be more appropriate for a nice neighbor than an assassin. But when authors go to the other extreme and name their characters along the lines of Brock Savage or Hunter Chevalier—I’m talking thrillers here, not Harlequin romances—I cannot take them seriously. I keep expecting someone to rip open his shirt while caught in the rain in a meadow.

My theory is, the names that work best are those with one unusual name combined with a more common one. Indiana Jones, Sherlock Holmes, Dave Robicheaux, Elvis Cole, Sam Spade, Jane Marple, Matthew Scudder. I’ve known people named Jones, Holmes, Dave, Cole, Sam, Jane, and Matthew, so that makes those characters relatable, while the other half of their names sets them apart. Give me two weird names and I’m just going to laugh, wondering if those characters have celebrity parents.

Have character names ever distracted you from an otherwise good story? What are some of your favorite literary names, and why do you like them?

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World Book Night 2012

You’ve probably heard/read a lot about the World Book Night that’s happening on April 23. It’s an event involving volunteer givers who will go out into their communities and give away 20 copies of a book they love to people who might not otherwise read, or are light readers. The previous deadline to apply as a giver was today, February 1, but it’s been extended to next Monday, February 6, midnight EST!

Carl Lennertz, Executive Director of World Book Night USA (it’s also happening in the UK on the same day), generously took some time to answer a few questions for me about this exciting event.

Pop Culture Nerd:  Why was the deadline extended?

Carl Lennertz: Mostly due to the Super Bowl ad we’re going to run. Hah! I sensed people were stressing and could use a little extra time. And we had built in some time. But I can’t go past Feb. 6. We could launch now with every state very well covered, and every city—and some towns I never heard of, which is great—but I figured the more the merrier. Even if I can’t have less stress, I can offer it to others.

PCN: Can you suggest some places that would make great locations for givers to find light readers?

CL: I hesitate to answer because I want the givers to do that themselves, to let it be spontaneous and original. And they have. The public TOTALLY gets this, and it’s been amazing to see the responses. If you like, I’ll share some after Feb. 6. Okay, okay, don’t pout. My favorites run from nursing home waiting rooms to pubs, from commuter buses (to those not reading—aha!) to schools in low-income neighborhoods.

PCN: What happens if you get an overabundance of requests for some of the titles and not enough for some of the others?

CL: We’re ahead of you on that one. That’s why the givers had to make a second and third choice. A fair number of givers had a different place in mind depending on the book they got!

PCN: What are your expectations for WBN? How will you rate its success?

Carl Lennertz

CL: I want all the givers to have a fun, safe, and rewarding day; for the bookstores and libraries to continue to be cherished as the community centers that they are; to get at least 100 local news stories and 2 national stories about WBN and the value of reading; to have a success that engenders some foundation money so we can grow this yearly; and ultimately, to touch the lives of a LOT of people. I won’t say change a life, as that’s a bit grandiose, but still, that would be possible. Just the gift of a book might touch the giver and recipient in some sweet or deep way.

PCN: If givers want to share their experiences about that night, is there a central message board/forum/site where they can go?

CL: I’m not as interested in any central sort of gathering point for the stories, except perhaps a WBN Flickr page. And Twitter is essentially national. But what I would love is for the year-round love and sharing to reside and go ’round locally within each community, with the bookstore or library at the center. We’re a huge country, and I’m big on regional flavor, or the flavor of communities, online or otherwise. And yes, it could all bubble up via natural interest groups, like teachers, soldiers, health care workers, government officials, caregivers of all sorts, and so on. We’ll see!

Thanks so much, Carl! And thank you to Wiley at AuthorsOnTheWeb.com for facilitating the interview.

If you haven’t applied to be a giver, go here for more info and to sign up. Here’s a list of the books that were chosen to be given away. If you’re in the UK & Eire, go here.

If you have applied, what books did you request, and why? Good luck and happy giving!

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Book Review: THE RETRIBUTION by Val McDermid

This originally ran in Shelf Awareness and is reprinted here with permission.

For her seventh thriller featuring profiler Dr. Tony Hill and Detective Chief Inspector Carol Jordan, Val McDermid unleases not one but two serial killers. The first, Jacko Vance, is their worst nightmare from the past, someone they put away years ago in The Wire in the Blood. Vance escapes from prison and is hell bent on, well, retribution. Jordan and Hill have to predict and protect the people, including each other, they feel are most in danger, but Vance seems to be several steps ahead of them. Meanwhile, they also have to hunt another killer doing grisly things to prostitutes. The cases are solved in the end, but Hill and Jordan experience unfathomable loss along the way, and their relationship, as well as their lives, will never be the same.

As usual, McDermid doesn’t flinch from exploring the dark passages of humanity, if one can even call the killers human. Vance does something so revolting at one point that my stomach dropped to the floor, as if I were in an elevator plunging into hell. But McDermid’s deft prose, sprinkled with psychological insight and sparks of wit, makes it hard to turn away. She also keeps the pace humming along, which helps since a lot happens. The ending is a bit anticlimactic, and the story could probably do with less of Hill’s internal monologue about how much he cares for Jordan—a point that’s repeatedly and clearly established—but McDermid has thrown such huge obstacles into the pair’s already rocky path that it’ll be interesting to see where they go from here.

Nerd verdict: Gut-wrenching Retribution

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