Ravens

Starred review from May 11, 2009
Soon after Mitch and Patsy Boatwright, two down-home one-step-above-poor-white Georgians, win the $318 million Max-a-Million jackpot in this stellar thriller from bestseller Green (The Juror
), they receive two unwelcome visitors—Shaw McBride and Romeo Zderko, who are fleeing nowhere techie jobs in Ohio for a never-never Florida dream. Shaw, the brains, and Romeo, his half-unwilling brawny pawn, threaten to kill the Boatwrights' loved ones unless the couple agree to hand over half their winnings. Through rapidly shifting points of view, especially the clear eyes of daughter Tara Boatwright, a community college student, Green frighteningly and unequivocally shows how victims can come to adore their tormentors, amid a mix of madness, fear, isolation, greed and delusions of power and glory. This exquisite novel of psychological suspense builds to a devastating resolution that will leave readers with the cold shudders for a long time afterward.

May 15, 2009
Fourteen years after he vanished from the bestseller lists, Green (The Juror, 1995, etc.) is back with a tale of two losers who see a Georgia family's lottery jackpot as their ticket to nirvana.

Shaw McBride and Romeo Zdenko are just passing through Brunswick, Ga., when they hear that a local couple, Mitch and Patsy Boatwright, have won $318 million. Shaw's facility at ferreting out online information about the family—especially about daughter Tara, 21, who wishes she were just passing through Brunswick as well—persuades him that they can grab half the payout if only they can persuade the Boatwrights that they're crazy and remorseless. Their scheme depends on nothing more than threats. If Mitch doesn't appear at a press conference to announce that Shaw was an old acquaintance who'd asked Mitch to pick up some lottery tickets for him too, Romeo, who's driving around the area from one set of friends and relatives to the next, will start killing whoever is closest. At first the scheme works improbably well, considering that although Shaw is a con man with a gift for telling people what they want to hear, Romeo is neither a killer nor a mental giant. As days pass, however, things start to change, and not in the ways you might expect. Instead of ratcheting up the tension, Green begins to plumb the unexpected depths of his characters. Romeo finds his only peace in caring for the dying father of the trailer-park queen who picked him up at a bar. Ineffectual local peace officer Burris Jones, aka Deppity Dawg, rouses himself on behalf of his high-school sweetheart Nell Boatwright, Tara's grandmother, who hasn't given him the time of day for a generation. And Tara, who craves excitement and maybe submission, begins to confuse imperious, insinuating Shaw with God.

The Desperate Hours on crank, with a deeply unsettling spiritual spin.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

May 1, 2009
Shaw and Romeo, friends from grade school to their present-day labors in dead-end tech-support jobs, are headed for a Florida vacation. In a Georgia convenience store, Shaw learns from a clerk that a local family purchased a lottery ticket worth $318 million, and he hatches a plan to get half of it. His plan is simple: Shaw takes the family hostage by telling them that Romeo is driving around their small city, ready to murder their loved ones if they dont support the ruse that Shaw is due half the winnings. As news of the familys big win spreads, crowds throng around the house, and the terror inside it grows. Green, the author of the acclaimed The Cavemans Valentine (2000), is skilled at psychological suspense. More than half a dozen major characters are fully developed, and their evolving reactions to their situations and to other characters are sure to engage readers who like to feel the narrative screws tightening.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)

Starred review from September 28, 2009
The Boatwrights are struggling to get by when they win $318 million in the Georgia State lottery. But the family's joy is short-lived when drifter Shaw McBride shows up at their door with a gun, takes the family hostage and demands half of the winnings. If they refuse or try to contact help, Shaw's partner in crime, Romeo Zderko, will kill everyone close to the Boatwrights. Robert Petkoff renders Shaw and Romeo with a perfect blend of menace and panic, while Maggi-Meg Reed's theatrical Southern drawl captures the community perfectly. This is a top-notch presentation with performances that will keep listeners enthralled and entertained from beginning to end. A Grand Central hardcover (Reviews, May 11).