Method 15/33 - Softcover

Kirk, Shannon

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1608091864 ISBN 13: 9781608091867

Publisher: Oceanview Publishing, 2016

Synopsis

2015 National Indie Excellence Award Winner for Best Suspense Novel

2015 School Library Journal Best Adult Books for Teens (1 of only 17 Novels Selected)

2016 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Awards Gold Winner Mystery/Suspense

Imagine a helpless, pregnant 16-year-old who's just been yanked from the serenity of her home and shoved into a dirty van. Kidnapped...Alone...Terrified.

Now forget her...

Picture instead a pregnant, 16-year-old, manipulative prodigy. She is shoved into a dirty van and, from the first moment of her kidnapping, feels a calm desire for two things: to save her unborn son and to exact merciless revenge.

She is methodical―calculating― scientific in her plotting. A clinical sociopath? Leaving nothing to chance, secure in her timing and practice, she waits―for the perfect moment to strike. Method 15/33 is what happens when the victim is just as cold as the captors.

The agents trying to find a kidnapped girl have their own frustrations and desires wrapped into this chilling drama.  In the twists of intersecting stories, one is left to ponder. Who is the victim? Who is the aggressor?  

About this title

About the Author

Shannon Kirk is a practicing attorney and a law professor. She attended West Virginia Wesleyan and St. John’s Universities, is a graduate of Suffolk Law School, and was a trial lawyer in Chicago prior to moving to Massachusetts.  She has been honored three times by the Faulkner Society in the William Faulkner-William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition.  She lives in Massachusetts with her husband, a physicist, and their son.  Method 15/33 was Kirk's debut novel.  Foreign rights have now been sold in 20 countries.

Review

"Method 15/33 is crowded with fascinating characters -- even the spear carriers pop off the page -- but the standout is the kidnapped pregnant teenager.  Her captors want her baby.  Little do they know they've brought an insanely brilliant, angry, vengeful, borderline sociopath under their roof.  Somebody's in big trouble... and it isn't the teenager."     

(―F. Paul Wilson, New York Times best-selling author of Santa Jack)

“Completely original and totally kick ass!  Shannon Kirk pulls no punches in this adrenaline rush of a thriller where the victim is the one to watch, while the kidnappers learn to fear.  Loved it! “ 

(―Lisa Gardner, New York Times best-selling author of Fear Nothing)

“What happens when infant traffickers kidnap the wrong pregnant teen?  You get Method 15/33,  a cross between The Lovely Bones and Silence of the Lambs.  Shannon Kirk's debut thriller is a dark, literate page turner, utterly compelling.  I read it in one sitting.”

(― Leonard Rosen, Award-winning author of All Cry Chaos and The Tenth Witness)

“Wow. Ridiculously good. Crazy good. Brilliantly heart-stoppingly nail-bitingly original, this is a true thriller tour de force. Shannon Kirk is an instant star.”

(―Hank Phillippi Ryan Agatha, Anthony and Mary Higgins Clark Award winning author of Truth be Told)

"In Kirk’s harrowing first novel, a kidnap victim―16 years old and pregnant―meticulously plots her escape. Although locked in a sparsely furnished third-floor room of what she believes to be a white farmhouse, the nameless narrator is confident that she can turn the tables on her male captor (“I had the wits to beat this horrible, disgusting thing”). Her visitors include a doctor and a couple she calls Mr. and Mrs. Obvious, who intend to take her baby. Fueled by a desire for revenge, she carefully catalogues every possible asset that she might use: a loose floorboard is #4, a pencil sharpener is #15, and so on. Meanwhile, FBI special agent Roger Liu investigates the abduction case of Dorothy M. Salucci, another in a series of missing pregnant teens, and he tracks a slim lead to rural Indiana. Back at the farmhouse, the narrator sets out to rescue herself, and with great cunning and patience she carries out the plan she calls 15/33. Her willpower and ingenuity prove more than a match for the callous brutality of those who wish her ill as this exciting tale builds to a surprising climax." Agent: Kimberley Cameron, Kimberley Cameron & Associates. (May) Reviewed on 03/06/2015 (Publishers Weekly - Starred Review)

"Nietzsche warned us to beware of people with a strong desire to punish. That thought lingers after putting down this dark, disturbing, damnably readable novel...a worthy challenge, a joy to discuss, and a great pairing with John Katzenback's equally riveting What Comes Next (2012)."

(―Booklist - Starred Review)

“Method 15/33 by Shannon Kirk has an extraordinary plot as well as an extraordinary character in Lisa Yyland, although we do not know her name until way into this crazy good book...Her thoughts, as she explains what she hopes to do, will bewilder you at the same time that you realize you're pulling for her. Make sure you have some extra time as you start this unusual and suspenseful novel. It is darn hard to put down. The only thing I wish is that I could meet this intelligent young woman but I am sure she wouldn't want to meet me. Good, good book. Don't miss it.”

(Bookloons.com)

"To summarize: this is just superb. One of the best thrillers I have read in years. It’s fresh. The writing totally encapsulates you from the very beginning to the very end. It will sicken you. It will keep you on the edge of your seat. You will read with one eye closed and you will find some of it harrowing. You will be amazed at the strength of the characters and how they think of things you would never think of. This proves to me the imagination Shannon Kirk has and believe me, we will be hearing a lot more from this lady in the future.

The highest possible recommendation and 5 stars."

(Nev Murray)

"Why don't we use the word "rip-roaring" anymore?  Because this was one rip-roaring thriller and I adored it....not that it's the Great American Novel, but because I couldn't put it down.

Thriller fan? Pick this one up when it's published.  You definitely won't regret it."

(Erin Brewster)

"What a great read!

An incredible first novel with a heroine reminding me very much of Alan Bradley's Flavia de Luce, not just in her manipulative and dispassionate outlook and scientific precision but also in her surprisingly mature thought processes and her ability - in this case, genetic - to restrict her emotional reactions."  

(Hilary Carter)

About this edition

• Publisher: Oceanview Publishing
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 1608091864
• ISBN 13: 9781608091867
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 258