 |
| Reviewer | Analyst | Commentator |
A CHILLING QUESTION.
“Just how would you start to cut up a human body?”
—Jimmy Stewart’s “L.B ‘Jeff’ Jefferies,” Rear Window (1954)
THE OPENING CREDITS.
From the publishers who brought you Whispers of the Dead and The Wife Between Us comes a vastly unsettling and abominably sinister tale of hatred, duplicity, jealousy, and cold, calculated murder.
MINOTAUR BOOKS
IN ASSOCIATION WITH MACMILLAN PRESS
PRESENTS
A MINOTAUR BOOKS PRODUCTION
A NOVEL BY JENNIFER HILLIER
GEORGINA SHAW • KAISER BRODY
“JAR OF HEARTS”
Also starring:
Angela Wong as Miss Popularity. Angela was the girl who owned it. The captain of the cheerleading squad was Angela. The girl who every boy desired—and who every girl envied and wanted to be—was Angela. Angela Wong was the beautiful butterfly who had it all, even all of the most enjoyable aspects of teen life at her perfectly manicured feet.
Victor Wong is the father of Angela Wong. A Microsoft bigwig who pals around with company founder Bill Gates, Vic spent more time golfing and playing poker with his fellow status-seeking buddies than being an attentive father to his only child, Angela.
Candace Wong Platten is the mother of Angela Wong. Divorced from Victor, the materialistic, snobbish, and self-absorbed Candy spent more time entertaining and playing hostess to her high society friends than she did being an attentive mother to her only child, Angela.
Walter Shaw is Georgina Shaw’s half Jamaican father. A wealthy and prominent ER doctor, Walter Shaw is a lovable and respectable man. A widower who has never remarried, Walt loves his only daughter, Geo, and has stood by her side through many struggles. Father and daughter share a close bond and are seemingly admirable in the ugly face of adversity.
Andrew Shipp is Georgina Shaw’s fiance. The so-called heir-to-the-throne of the Shipp family pharmaceutical empire, Andy, a fierce megalomaniac, revels—and proudly so—in his Whiteness, in his renowned family name, in his seemingly secure position on the totem pole of the Status Quo, and his in “purebred entitlements.” But in the brutal world of this fiction, Andrew Shipp will have his “loyalty” tried in a scorching flicker of fire.
Calvin James is the fearsome “Sweetbay Strangler.” Calvin is the main suspect in a series of murders involving several women and children, including Angela Wong. The distinctly handsome—and rather smug—Calvin James was the first lover of our leading lady, Georgina Shaw, and the infuriating nemesis of our leading man, Kaiser Brody.
With:
Ella Frank is the wife of the notorious drug lord, James Frank. Black and scrumptiously beautiful, but extremely dangerous and deadly, Ella Frank is sitting in Hazelwood Correctional Institution (or Hellwood, if you please) serving back-to-back life sentences for the murder of two—or more—rivals of her infamous husband.
Cat Bonaducci is Georgina’s replacement mother. A former cigar girl from Chicago, the auburn-haired Cat (Cool name, huh?) Bonaducci is one of the more adorable inmates at Hazelwood Correctional Institution. The upbeat Cat is serving a fifteen-year prison sentence for a drunk-driving accident that killed another motorist. Cat occupies a private cell in the facility. And much like Ella Frank, she has become a dear friend and close confidant of Georgina Shaw.
Kim Kellogg is the Seattle police detective who is Kaiser Brody’s partner and on-the-down-low lover: for it is with the neat freak Kim (Cool name, huh?) that Kaiser “Kai” Brody is engaged in an extramarital affair.
Introducing:
Dominic John Kent in his show-stopping role as the charmingly handsome eighteen-year-old for whom Georgina Shaw harbors a uniquely special love. Dominic John Kent is an intelligent young man whom Satan has requested to sift like wheat—despite Georgina’s determination to shield and protect him.
ONCE UPON A TIME ...
SEATTLE, WA—Georgina Shaw, Kaiser Brody, Angela Wong, and Calvin James all have a long, grueling, and languishing history.
Once upon a time, Georgina Shaw, our one-eighth Black and half Filipino leading lady, and her best friends Angela Wong and Kaiser Brody lived their best lives during their happy-go-lucky teens. Always inseparable, the three best friends did what all kids in their age group do: they hung out together, shopped together, ate-and-drank together, laughed together, cried together, went to movies and high school football games, weekend parties, the whole bit. They were happy and popular sixteen-year-old students attending the prestigious St. Martin’s High School in the gorgeous city of Seattle. But that was once upon a time.
Both Angela and Geo (popular for days) were top members of the St. Martin’s High cheer squad and Kaiser? Well, Kai was a boy in his own right, a very talented player on both the high school’s soccer and basketball teams. The three best friends (the tall, skinny guy and his two gorgeous gal pals) had their entire lives mapped out ahead of them. The future was to be so bright that they would each need their very own Ray-Bans. That was until the day the three of them went to the 7-Eleven, only a stone’s throw away from their school, to purchase the usual: a grape Slurpee for the drop-dead gorgeous Angela, a blue raspberry Slurpee for the pretty Geo, and a Big Gulp for the somewhat nerdy Kai.
It was while walking back to Angela’s car—to be on their carefree way—that the three indivisible besties would make the acquaintance of a Rebellious Angel hiding inside of the chiseled, muscular physique belonging to Calvin James. Calvin James, then twenty-one-years-old, just so happened to be out in the parking lot with a few of his buddies. The guys are drinking beers and mocking time. But of course, the older guys don’t leave well enough alone when they spot the three uniformed teens, especially the two lovely girls. And Angela immediately takes all of the attention. It’s only natural for her. However, the “Adonis,'' who is Calvin James, is only interested in Georgina. And he makes this known in no uncertain terms, striking up a conversation with the perky teenager and issuing her his cell number.
They were all smiles, Geo and Calvin. Back and forth they went, exchanging a lot of cutesy quips among other flirtatious banter. But that’s always the pattern: in the beginning, there are always smiles. Everything always seems so perfect, so sweet and innocent. But no man knows the future; only God does. And had Geo, Angela, and Kai known what the future would bring, the three friends would have just gotten into their car and drove away, never looking back, not even for a glance. They may have even opted to get their Slurpees and their Big Gulp on an entirely different day. If only they had known what the future would bring.
FOURTEEN YEARS LATER.
Georgina Shaw is now a wealthy corporate executive, Kaiser Brody is a top detective with the Seattle Police Department, and Angela Wong is long dead.
As the storyline begins to evolve inside a courtroom, Calvin James, the so-called Sweetbay Strangler, is on trial for the brutal murder of the once-favored Angela Wong. And seated on the witness stand, elegantly clad in the two world-famous Christians—Dior and Louboutin—is none other than Georgina Shaw, his former teen lover and an accomplice in the Wong killing. The remains of Angela Wong, missing for a long time, were unearthed: a pile of bones buried in a shallow grave in the woods only steps away from the Shaw house. And Geo has lived the last fourteen years of her life riddled with guilt about the premature death of her best friend, not to mention her burial place. Geo is now on the witness stand. And the packed courtroom, including the parents of Angela, is listening to her testimony, emotional as it is. Georgina must now witness to the court her role in the murder and dismemberment of her former best friend, Angela Wong.
The details of her testimony are repulsive. And they are enough to cause her fiance, Andrew Shipp, to run out of the courtroom. The uptight elitist makes a scene and induces gasping from any number of the remaining spectators. But this is the least of Geo’s problems: for her pariah awaits, as does a five-year prison sentence—to be served in Hazlewood Correctional Institution, otherwise known as Hellwood.
While incarcerated, Geo (a beauty school graduate stationed in the prison salon) befriends two women who will become her stability on the inside: Ella Frank, a ruthless murderess, and Cat Bonaducci, the perfectly coiffed doll with whom Geo will fall madly in love, platonically. But regardless of newfound friendships, five years is a long time to be behind prison walls. It’s just enough time for a person to become institutionalized.
MEANWHILE, ON THE OUTSIDE ...
Kaiser Brody, a man who has always loved and wanted Geo since they were teens, is hunting a demoniac in the form of a serial killer. And his prey just so happens to be her former lover, Calvin James. Kai had always hated the arrogant Calvin, not only for securing Geo right before his very eyes but also for his confidence from so many years back. Calvin James had loved to rub the teen Kai’s then acne-prone face in his twenty-one-year-old mack and swagger. But now, the delicious-looking, well-scented, tall, and rugged Kai is the one wearing the badge. And the once self-satisfied rapist and murderer, Calvin James, is the escaped convict.
Kai is desperate to get medieval on his old nemesis, especially now that the remains of more dead—and dismembered—women are turning up buried in shallow graves. And not only those women but children, too. The remains of many strangled children have surfaced. And Kai is convinced that the murders are the handiwork of the depraved Calvin James: for they all have the same MO. But chasing this particular homicidal maniac can be likened to chasing a ghost. And the chase is beginning to wear wearily upon the psyche of Detective Kaiser Brody.
Kaiser wonders if Geo might know the whereabouts of her former beau. Could it be that Geo has something to hide?
THE HOMECOMING.
Anything but pleasant is the homecoming of the ex-con Geo. She has come back to her childhood home to live with her ever-doting (but forever absent) father, Walter. But my, how the mighty have fallen. The once lavish Geo is now hated with ferocity by their neighbors, primarily that old, vindictive, and self-righteous Mrs. Roberta Heller from across the street. The ultimate busybody here, the older woman swears on her miserable life that she has not seen the vandals who have been spray-painting obscenities directed at Geo on their garage door. But the bitter bird makes it no secret that they all (she and the other neighbors) want Geo to move out and away from their upstanding little cul-de-sac. Especially now that two more bodies, one a dismembered woman with her eyes removed, have been found buried in nearly the same spot from which the remains of Angela Wong unearthed only five years earlier.
On the contrary, the romantic tension is strongly brewing, like the Nespresso machine in her kitchen, between Geo and her old friend, Kai Brody. But despite his intense feelings for her, Kai is still persuaded to believe that Geo knows more than she’s letting on about her former (and first) love, the elusive Calvin James.
WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST.
The serial killer has a twisted code of conduct. The murderer is not on a mission to salvage the lives but to destroy them, methodically and utterly. And the Seattle Police Department has its job cut out for it, literally. The authorities are constantly finding the dismembered, eyeless bodies of women, along with those bodies of small children who have been strangled to death and then buried in shallow graves in wooded areas. The first victims they found buried in the woods near the comely home of Walter and Georgina Shaw, and now another pair—a woman and a small child—have been unearthed in the wooded area behind St. Martin High School. Coincidence? Or no? While the Sweetbay Strangler continues to slip through the frustrated hands of Kaiser Brody, the body parts of his female victims continue to pile up. And while it is true that Kim Kellogg is a vital asset to Brody’s and her case, their extramarital affair walks a dangerous tightrope without a balancing tool.
Still, they theorize. And so does my engrossed reader. Who is it that they’re chasing? Who is the human host for the demon called Murderous Spirit? How much rage would it take for one human being to murder another one? Why are birth mothers and adopted children so gravely despised? If Calvin James has killed before, wouldn’t he be capable of killing again? Is Calvin James the monster who continues to stay ahead of the curve, or is it someone else entirely? How hard can it be to catch a gelid-spirited murderer? How hard can it be? Well, when that gelid-spirited murderer just so happens to be the antagonist imagined by his creator, Jennifer Hillier, to terrorize his fellow castmates on the pages of this treacherous anecdote, then catching him is a task that will prove quite challenging.
Is evil truly genetic? My answer—as the examiner of this alarming tale—is yes. For indeed, the curse is upon such people, to visit each one, even to the third and fourth generation.
THE EXAMINER’S FINDINGS.
Fred Argent, Bernadine Novotny, Julie Chan, and Caroline Robinson co-star in this widely complex and masterfully written thriller, joining an extended cast of superior performers: for wherever there is a twist on these atrocious, cunning, and gruesomely detailed pages, know for a surety that there is also a turn acting as its co-conspirator.
Unlike those psychological thrillers that claim to have endings a reader won’t see coming (although many of them are predictable), Jar of Hearts—the title inspired by Red Cinnamon Hearts Imperials—is an intense dialogue that genuinely lives up to that declaration. There is absolutely nothing predictable about it. And for her creation of this script, Hillier is most certainly meritable of great praise. On these pages, her vision is wicked, sensational; and her creative writing is exceptional. For the imprint embossed on this tale was not lost on yours truly. And if I may say as much, I have yet to view a work of fiction issued by St. Martin’s Press that has left me in a funk of disappointment.
Every great work of the written word is deserving of great representation. And once again, St. Martin’s Press/Macmillan/Minotaur Books has boldly commanded my reader’s utmost respect.
Be ye a no-nonsense diehard of the psychological thriller genre? Be ye a no-nonsense diehard of a gripping murder mystery? If so, trust that Jar of Hearts is, for you, an imperative must-read. Know for a surety that the work does its respective class tremendous justice.
Five saw-toothed stars.
REVIEWER’S NOTE: It is my kind pleasure to thank Minotaur Books, as well as NetGalley, for the advanced review copy (ARC) of Jar of Hearts in exchange for my honest review.
Analysis of Jar of Hearts by Jennifer Hillier is courtesy of the Reviews by Cat Ellington book series.
Date of Review: Monday, June 25, 2018
.
©2025 Quill Pen Ink Publishing. Literary Criticism by Cat Ellington for The Arts. The Cat Ellington™ Literary Collection. The Cat Ellington™ Poetry Collection. All rights reserved.
NEXT UP: Cat Ellington's review of The Plastic Surgeon by AJ Carter
Having read this tantalizing, superb book review, I have been intrigued enough to journey into this literary work. And I must say, it did not disappoint me! A thriller of the finest caliber with so vicious with its plot twists and deceptive characters that it was hard to put down!
ReplyDeleteHello, Cat Ellington. I have a request. Do you have any available autographed copies of your books from the Reviews by Cat Ellington series? Please say yes! Thanks
ReplyDelete