Hocus: An Irene Kelly Mystery - Softcover

Burke, Jan

4

1,261 ratings by Goodreads

9780061044397: Hocus: An Irene Kelly Mystery

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0061044393 ISBN 13: 9780061044397

Publisher: HarperTorch, 1998

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When her husband, Frank Hannigan, is kidnapped and the kidnappers known as "Hocus" start playing twisted games, Irene Kelly will stop at nothing to find him and puts her own life in jeopardy. Reprint.

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Review:

Jan Burke's stories about a vulnerable and resourceful reporter at a Southern California newspaper called Las Piernas News Express all feature tense and thoughtful plots, writing that manages to be sharp and sardonic without calling attention to itself, and a dead honest picture of the world of small-market newspaper journalism. Her latest is no exception. When Kelly's homicide detective husband, Frank Harriman, gets a heroic write-up in her paper after arresting the apparent leader of a gang of murderous troublemakers that call themselves Hocus (in the sense of hoax, rather than magic), everybody at the paper and almost everybody at the cop shop thinks she's behind it. So when Frank disappears, and his blood is discovered in the trunk of his car, Irene doesn't get much help from the paper or the police. She has to track down the real secret of Hocus largely on her own--which she does in the completely credible and exciting manner we've come to expect. Burke's last book about about Kelly, Remember Me, Irene, is out in paperback, joining Dear Irene, Goodnight, Irene, and Sweet Dreams, Irene.

From the Publisher:

Rising star Jan Burke -- whom reviewers have consistently compared to Patricia Cornwell, Sue Grafton, and Robert Parker -- pulls out all the stops in her most powerful work to date.

In this thunderously paced heart stopper, intrepid sleuth/reporter Irene Kelly is put to the test when her detective husband is taken hostage.

Tension mounts from the first pages when Irene's detective husband, Frank Harriman, turns up missing, a bloodstain is found in the trunk of his car, and an ominous warning is left on the rearview mirror suggesting he's been kidnapped.

Burke never lets up the pressure, skillfully raising the suspense to a rolling boil by the end of this wild and exciting ride.

Hocus delivers the same intricate plotting, clever dialogue, and gobbledown prose readers have come to expect from Jan Burke, but she now exceeds already high expectations in her strongest book yet.

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