The latest treat for dog lovers by Goodavage (Top Dog: The Story of Marine Hero Lucca, 2014, etc.) takes readers into the world of the canines and handlers who protect the president and the White House.
The Secret Service is notoriously closed to journalists, which means that the author was prohibited from revealing much of the information she gathered in her interviews and restricted to giving first names and initials for most of her interviewees. While hardly a hard-hitting investigation of the role of canines in the sometimes controversial agency, her account will satisfy those curious about the lives of working dogs and their people. Goodavage covers a number of such comradeships, weaving them into the story of spunky Hurricane, who under the instructions of handler Marshall M. took down a “fence jumper” at the White House in 2014. Intriguing chapters explore the selection of dogs from a training facility in a small town in Indiana, where the Belgian Malinois, who make up the larger part of the guard, and bomb-sniffing dogs are brought after being raised for a couple of years in Europe, and the work life of the so-called “Friendly Dogs,” unassuming, floppy-eared canines whose handlers cover the streets near the White House seeking out the scent of explosives on individuals. The author has a tendency to go off on tangents, seemingly depending on people with whom she had more extensive interviews: one chapter, for example, delves into the life history of a handler who spent his childhood in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, and another examines the veterinary history of a dog subject to heat sickness.
While the book suffers from the fact that the Secret Service is understandably reluctant to reveal any explosives that have been discovered or subjects disarmed under the watch of its canine patrollers, Goodavage’s subjects and their companions are quirky and dedicated enough to engage readers wondering about those dogs on the White House lawn.
In Brad Parks’ new thriller Say Nothing, judge Scott Sampson doesn’t brag about having a perfect life, but the evidence is clear: a prestigious job. A beloved family. On an ordinary Wednesday afternoon, he is about to pick up his six-year-old twins to go swimming when his wife, Alison, texts him that she’ll get the kids from school instead. It’s not until she gets home later that Scott realizes she doesn’t have the children. And she never sent the text. Then the phone rings, and every parent’s most chilling nightmare begins. A man has stolen Sam and Emma. For Scott and Alison, the kidnapper’s call is only the beginning of a twisting, gut-churning ordeal of blackmail, deceit, and terror; a high-profile trial like none the judge or his wife has ever experienced. Their marriage falters. Suspicions and long-buried jealousies rise to the surface. Fractures appear. Lies are told. “The nerve-shredding never lets up for a minute as Parks picks you up by the scruff of the neck, shakes you vigorously, and repeats over and over again till a climax so harrowing that you’ll be shaking with gratitude that it’s finally over,” our critic writes in a starred review.
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In Yoojin Grace Wuertz’s debut novel Everything Belongs to Us, the setting is Seoul in 1978. At South Korea’s top university, the nation’s best and brightest compete to join the professional elite of an authoritarian regime. Success could lead to a life of rarefied privilege and wealth; failure means being left irrevocably behind. For childhood friends Jisun and Namin, the stakes couldn’t be more different. Jisun, the daughter of a powerful business mogul, grew up on a mountainside estate with lush gardens and a dedicated chauffeur. Namin’s parents run a tented food cart from dawn to curfew; her sister works in a shoe factory. Now Jisun wants as little to do with her father’s world as possible, abandoning her schoolwork in favor of the underground activist movement, while Namin studies tirelessly in the service of one goal: to launch herself and her family out of poverty. But everything changes when Jisun and Namin meet an ambitious, charming student named Sunam, whose need to please his family has led him to a prestigious club: the Circle. Under the influence of his mentor, Juno, a manipulative social climber, Sunam becomes entangled with both women, as they all make choices that will change their lives forever. “Engrossing,” our reviewer writes in a starred review. “Wuertz is an important new voice in American fiction.”
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