A tale of espionage and political intrigue that invites incredulity and, finally, indifference.
After surviving an assassination attempt, an American senator investigates an imminent terrorist attack on the nation in Kent’s thriller.
Nate Tourneur, a senator representing Rhode Island, takes a much-needed break from his hectic schedule by going sailing in Martha’s Vineyard. While there, he’s enchanted by a beautiful stranger, Sarita Montoya, an entertainer from Puerto Rico, and their flirtatious conversation continues back at Nate’s hotel room. When he wakes, he finds her dead, and later her body simply vanishes; his situation shifts “from tragic to a miasma of intrigue.” When he finds a small microphone in his room, he anxiously frets that she was part of a blackmailing scheme. Later, while sailing, he’s attacked by a sniper in a helicopter. In a scene so ludicrously implausible it will elicit more guffaws than thrills, Nate manages to survive both gunfire and a launched rocket and successfully downs the helicopter. While discussing the incident with various intelligence agencies, he recalls a peculiar poem Sarita recited that emphasized the words “imposing encounter,” which turns out to be a code for an imminent attack against the United States, likely aided by Iran. Nate decides to conduct an investigation of his own, and, accompanied by FBI agent Pilar Cruz, he flies to Puerto Rico in search of information about Sarita. The duo discovers that Sarita had ties to the PDL, a shady outfit that specializes in organ donation run by David Rashidani, an Iranian who served in the Revolutionary Guard.
The author intelligently pieces together a complex plot against the U.S., one that possibly includes a devastating biochemical assault. The great virtue of the story is its impressive unpredictability, which allows Kent to build an atmosphere of suspense and chilling expectancy. But too much of the plot is entirely unbelievable, as is the novel’s protagonist, who seems like a pastiche of action-movie characters played by Harrison Ford. Nate is a 41-year-old former Naval intelligence officer and star athlete, perfectly capable of physically fending off assassins with cheerful aplomb. He relentlessly makes light of his terrible predicament by bombarding his interlocutors with clever quips—to his great fortune, they all respond in kind. When tackled to the ground by an FBI agent tasked with bringing him in—Nate didn’t realize his pursuers were FBI agents and was running away—this exchange occurs: “‘Are you a terrorist from Texas?’ I say. ‘San Antonio,’ says the leader of the pack. ‘You set me in a horn-tossing mood.’ … ‘I won’t apologize,’ I say. ‘You’re lucky to be alive, jumping through those trains.’ ‘When you’ve chased jackrabbits on the prairie, you don’t need breakfast to catch a man.’” No one talks like this, certainly not under conditions of such duress and fear. Unfortunately, this exchange is exemplary of all the dialogue in the novel. Readers will be entirely engrossed by the first 50 pages of Kent’s political thriller, but the remainder offers only diminishing returns.
A tale of espionage and political intrigue that invites incredulity and, finally, indifference.Pub Date: June 20, 2024
ISBN: 9798886795813
Page Count: 260
Publisher: Luminare Press
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Maybe not the most thrilling thriller, but the role of AI in coping with grief gives this novel pathos and interest.
A widowed and disgraced plastic surgeon is drawn into a Russian oligarch’s evil schemes.
Witherspoon’s adult fiction debut, co-authored with thrillermeister Coben, opens as heart surgery performed by Dr. Marc Adams in a North African refugee camp is interrupted by the explosive invasion of armed militants. It's the last we will see of Marc in this dimension. The next chapter jumps ahead one year to a ceremony at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore where his widow, Maggie McCabe, is supposed to be presenting an award in honor of her mother. Miserable and anxious about appearing in public after having lost her medical license, she consults with her late husband on her phone—not via supernatural means, but using a "griefbot," an amazingly lifelike and functional AI app created by her genius sister, Sharon. Once the griefbot coaxes her to brave the sneering masses, she learns she’s been replaced on the podium anyway. But she runs into a former professor, a celebrity plastic surgeon, who requests a meeting with her at his office in New York and won’t take no for an answer. Next thing she knows, there’s $10 million in her bank account and she’s on a private plane heading to a palace outside Moscow where she’s been engaged to perform off-the-record surgery on billionaire Oleg Ragoravich (new face) and his girlfriend, Nadia (new boobs). And…we’re off. A whirl of surgeries, chases, and escapes ensues as Maggie gradually comes to understand who these people are and what they have in mind for her, and how it connects to Marc and their missing friend and business partner, Trace Packer. She is aided by her delightful father-in-law, Porkchop, owner of a biker bar in New York City and a very handy guy to have on your team if you've run afoul of an international criminal organization. From the palace in Rublevka the action moves to Dubai and then Bordeaux, climaxing in a high-stakes illegal heart transplant. But wait—is Marc really dead? What happened to Trace? Who is Nadia really? Though these smoldering questions don’t quite catch fire, it's a good first try for Witherspoon.
Maybe not the most thrilling thriller, but the role of AI in coping with grief gives this novel pathos and interest.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781538774700
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Fast-moving and disturbingly plausible.
Robots may be the future of warfare in this final father-son DeMille collaboration.
In Camp Hayden, Army Maj. Roger Ames is found dead, his skull crushed. Chief Warrant Officers Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor, special agents of the United States Army Criminal Investigation Division, are sent to the Mojave Desert, “a.k.a. in the middle of nowhere,” to investigate. In this fictional military installation, Army Rangers conduct field training exercises with lethal autonomous weapons. These “dangerous new toys,” nicknamed “tin men,” may become the future of warfare if they can be programmed to distinguish between friend and foe. Anyway, the Rangers’ job is to train the tin men, not the other way around. They are AI-driven robotic prototypes called D-17s, but even prototypes can kill. Did a bot kill the major? And was there criminal liability or intent, or was it a tragic accident? Brodie and Taylor discover that not everyone loves these beasts, and they must find out if humans are programming them for mischief or even trying to set up the program for failure. Meanwhile, the bots have nicknames. Bot number 20 is Bucky, seen on a video as a “seven-foot-tall titanium machine with hands covered in blood and brain matter” that has “a face but no eyes, with hands but no skin, with a body but no soul.” As scary as these beasties are, Brodie and Taylor must also look at the humans at Camp Hayden, because they learn that the “machines don’t have motives….They have inputs and outputs,” which naturally come from human programmers. They have neither brains nor courage nor honor; they do have brute force, speed, and agility. Obviously, plenty goes haywire in this enjoyable yarn. It feels a bit too believable for comfort, and that’s to the DeMilles’ credit as storytellers. Nelson DeMille had begun this project with his son Alex, who had to finish it alone after his father’s death.
Fast-moving and disturbingly plausible.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781501101878
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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