Love from Midwest Book Review

Midwest Book Review

D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer

TwinStar, a “GW Canyon Journey,” is a novel of psychological suspense that opens with a pre-chapter note reflecting on author D. Cohen’s own journey as he resurrects a manuscript, only to realize that:

“When I pulled out a manuscript I’d written thirty years ago, I thought: not bad. Action. Momentum. A strong male protagonist at the center of everything. The kind of book that moves... Then I went back in. The "first pass was a disaster. I was still writing from the same angle — male gaze, male logic, male consequence. The women in the story were competent and credible, but they were there to react. To witness. To complete the picture around him. I have a hard-earned lifelong insight: women are more interesting than men.”

From this revelation came revisions that resulted in what readers hold in their hands today – a proactive, startling story, the first in a five-book series about a man who may believe and present himself as the central focus, but who actually relies on the strong women who accompany him on his journey.

This perspective gives TwinStar an unusual, exciting countenance as it delves into scenarios of a crashing commercial jetliner and the persona of GW Canyon, a powerful tech executive who likes to think he is always in control, and the women in his life who prove otherwise.

Readers won’t expect the blend of romance, realization, and action which mark Canyon’s world, but this is one of the attractions of a character and story whose achievements and perspective undergo a sea change of revision as the plot unfolds.

As GW, Allison, Lisa, and other characters follow clues about what is really happening, readers join them for a rollicking ride through possibilities that contrast the different analytical modes and strengths of men and women:

The chase was running hot. But she stopped. Looked at the phone. Looked at GW.

“Say more,” she said.

“I can’t,” he said honestly. “It just feels fast. Like we might be stepping on something we can’t step back from.”

She turned that over. He wasn’t wrong that it was fast. He also wasn’t wrong that instinct was a legitimate instrument — she knew that from the lab, from seventeen years of reading systems before she could name what was failing in them.

D. Cohen presents these shifting approaches to problem-solving and investigation with an eye to revealing new threads of not just emotional connection, but realization. GW accepts the women in his world as being uniquely talented in different ways - some of which he finds completely foreign to his own approaches.

Cohen weaves these perspectives and moments of enlightenment into an overall suspenseful deep dive into intelligence processes which will delight readers seeking thrillers that contrast the strengths of all involved.

The equation of love and danger, the resources and revelations and disappointments which accompany growing connections between dots of romance and discovery, and the threads and loose ends the investigation provides makes for riveting reading.

The novel’s ability to introduce a series that stands nicely alone with a definitive conclusion makes it an attraction to those who enjoy emotional undercurrents in their suspense stories that offer clear resolutions:

She considered the future the way she approached most things now —not as a fantasy, but as a set of doors she could choose to open or leave closed.

Librarians choosing TwinStar for their collections will find its dual focus on the men and women who assume different forms of leadership mantles in an overall effort to survive, love, and live makes for an engrossing build-up of tension and possibilities that will engage readers to the end.