Reviews

Speaking of Book Reviews (Reviewed in The Meredian)
By Jennie Hansen

...This is the story of a young man, Lance, whose car breaks down between Salt Lake City and Wendover. While he waits for a tow truck he discovers a gun and military dog tags buried in the salt and sand a short distance from his car and decides to keep them.

The tow truck diver befriends Lance and invites him to move in with him and two other roommates while they work on his car. One of the roommates, Ben, and Ben's sister, Enin, who is a frequent visitor at the house the boys rent, become particularly close friends. Through a series of clever deductions, the man who hid the gun discovers who took it and comes after it because it links him to a murder he committed. The deranged man places all five of the young people in serious jeopardy, which brings the sheriff and their bishop who is also a sheriff's deputy into the plot. Action and excitement follow.

Most LDS novels featuring nineteen- to early twenty-somethings, feature college students, and are terribly white collar. This book breaks that mold. The characters are very much blue collar. They work on cars, have grease under their fingernails, four-wheel, stop at outhouses, love trucks, and eat at MacDonalds. Mag lights and tow ropes are standard gear in their vehicles. They target practice with rifles for recreation and their vocabulary is not the same as that of their college-bound contemporaries. The four young men are far from being the stereotypical young LDS men of their age found in most LDS fiction. Aylstock is to be commended for her realistic portrayal of these young men and for the way she deals with the doubts and questions facing young adults in the Church...

The plot flows smoothly, the characters are likable and clever, there's action aplenty, and the overall tone of the book is hopeful and positive. Aylstock faces a number of biases and assumptions straight on to deliver a story that won't be quickly forgotten...

(You can read the full review here)