Jack Anderson is a successful businessman approaching retirement age.
Born in Scotland Jack was abandoned by his mother and father when he was a young boy. Eventually Jack was adopted by an American couple and moved to Boston.
For most of his life Jack pushed aside his past. With his impending retirement getting closer Jack begins an investigation. He knows he had an older sister and he discovers she is still alive. Along with his wife Anne, Jack decides to go back to Scotland to face his past and makes many discoveries along the way.
This is the first book I have read by Ian Hamilton. From what I know about the Ava Lee novels I imagine this quite a departure from his previous stories. There is an element of mystery to the story since Jack discovers new information about his family.
BONNIE JACK was a good story and I enjoyed it.
Thank you to House of Anansi Press and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced e-edition of BONNIE JACK.

A stand alone novel from the author of the Ava Lee mysteries.
Jack was abandoned by his mother and, as an adult, travels to Scotland in search of his long lost sister.
Secrets are unveiled on this voyage of discovery.
The writing was a bit choppy and the ending felt abrupt.
Otherwise, it was an interesting read.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an arc in exchange for my honest review.

Published by House of Anansi Press on June 1, 2021

Bonnie Jack is a throwback to a time when writers created credible characters in conflict and used them to tell a straightforward story. There is nothing postmodernist about Bonnie Jack. As a family drama, the story is a departure from Ian Hamilton’s crime fiction. Yet Hamilton’s Ava Lee books can be read as family dramas, albeit dramas about a crime family, an Asian version of the Sopranos. Although I wouldn’t call it a crime novel, Bonnie Jack does end with a crime, one that creates a moral dilemma for the protagonist, who must decide whether to make a personal sacrifice to help a family that, four days earlier, he didn’t know existed.

As a young man with a degree in accounting, Jack Anderson got a job with an insurance company and worked his way to the top. His competitive style — legal but cutthroat — earned him the name Bloody Jack, a nickname he detests.

With his retirement date looming, Jack is confronting a new and uncertain life. Perhaps that is what motivates him to finally confront a memory of his childhood in Scotland — the memory of his mother taking his sister to the restroom during a movie and never returning. Jack’s father didn’t want him, so Jack was taken to an orphanage. Jack was fortunate to be adopted by a loving American family, but his abandonment shaped his personality. He doesn’t trust easily. He bottles up his pain and doesn’t share it with his family. He carries a huge resentment of his mother and has never understood how she could have left him in the theater.

Jack now has a loving family of his own, but he has never told them that he was adopted. He decides the time has come to reveal his secret. More than that, he wants to travel to Scotland to ask his sister why his mother left him. After overcoming her shock, Jack’s supportive wife Anne agrees to travel to Scotland with him. During the trip, Jack not only finds his sister, but learns that he has two siblings and a niece he never knew about.

Hamilton conveys Jack’s pain without portraying him as a victim. Jack’s sister offers a sympathetic view of Jack’s mother, reminding us that we can’t understand why people behave as they do when we have not walked in their shoes. Jack is too settled into resentment to accept his sister’s perspective. Anne provides an important bridge between the two siblings, reminding them that their different views of their mother should not be the defining fact of their relationship. Anne’s humanity and the bridge she builds becomes an important factor in a critical decision that Jack must make at the novel’s end.

Jack goes through a tough week in Scotland, particularly after he learns that his father is still alive. A confrontation with his father leads to police involvement. News of the minor scandal makes its way to Jack’s board of directors, creating another stressor in his life. Jack doesn’t handle every conflict as well as he might. But then, neither did his parents. Neither do most people.

Bonnie Jack employs a simple, fast-moving plot to tell a morally complex tale. Toward the novel’s end, Jack is faced with a difficult decision that will test his character, the kind of decision that asks the reader to wonder “What would I do?” Hamilton uses Jack to remind the reader that most people are inclined toward selfishness and self-absorption, traits they need to overcome to realize their full potential as human beings. Hamilton doesn’t preach or pontificate, but in the time-honored tradition of novelists, he illustrates how hard decisions are a test of moral fiber. Readers who are looking for a throwback novel by a skilled storyteller should give Bonnie Jack a try.

RECOMMENDED

The plot of this was good but the book lacked in execution. The ending was just too abrupt and muddled. Jack should have stayed Bloody Jack with an attitude like his.

This is a quick, easy read, good for a summer day on the beach or at the cottage or in a Muskoka chair in the back yard.

Jack Anderson was abandoned by his mother in a Glasgow movie theatre when he was six years old. She left to take his sister Moira to the washroom and never returned. He is now a successful multi-millionaire nearing retirement. In all those years, he has not told his wife Anne and their children about his past. After finally sharing his story of abandonment and adoption, he and Anne travel to Scotland to see Moira whom he has located. While in the country of his birth, Jack learns he has more family than Moira, and meeting them has unexpected consequences.

The novel is very readable. What irritated me, however, are the unnecessary details that are included. For instance, do we really need to know what everyone is drinking? At the beginning we learn that “Anne liked gin martinis [while] her husband drank Scotch.” In fact, there are over 25 references to Scotch, not including mentions of Scotch eggs and Scotch pies! Some of the conversations don’t sound natural; for example, would a wife say to her husband of many years, “’You know I have a degree in English literature from UMass Amherst’”?

Descriptions of houses focus on windows and doors: Jack and Anne’s house “had two storeys, with six windows on the upper floor facing the road, and two huge windows on either side of a bright red double door on the ground floor." Later, we have this description: “Harry’s house was built of brick, with a red slate roof, a large window to the left of the front door, and three windows across the front of the second storey.” Then a pub “had a brown brick façade that was black in places, and small, dirty windows on either side of a glass door etched with thistles.” Moira lives “in the middle of a row of rather grimlooking houses, their doors set into walls of grey stone with windows on either side. Some of the doors had been painted bright colours.” This fixation on windows extends to characters always walking to a window and looking out; this happens at least 15 times.

There is considerable suspense. Chapters often end on a dramatic note with announcements like “’He’s dead’” and “’She’s had a visit from one of the Baxter boys. We need to talk.’” Unfortunately, there are elements that require some suspension of disbelief. Duncan Pike, “a top-notch lawyer,” becomes important in the latter part of the book, but some of his behaviour is rather shady, if not illegal. And “’Scottish criminal royalty . . . who run most of the drug and prostitution business’” and are not averse to physical violence would feel bound by a contract?

Jack is not a likeable character. His nickname in the business world is Bloody Jack, and he admits, “’I didn’t get the nickname Bloody Jack by being a nice guy. I trust no one. Everyone is disposable.’” He also admits to having trust issues; he has kept secrets from his wife and children for much of his life and his conversations concerning postponing his retirement are never mentioned to Anne: “’I love Anne, but there are things I don’t tell her, and some of those things she has a right to know. ‘” I don’t understand what Jack’s appeal is to Anne; she always seems to be walking on eggshells and reacting so as not to upset him. He has difficulty accepting people who disagree with him, and he seems incapable of forgiveness. When he makes what most people would consider a right decision, it is only because of his own self-interest and fear. And we are to believe that such a successful man has not really given more thought to his retirement and what that entails? In terms of character, Jack is not Bonnie Jack, and I found it difficult to care about what might happen to him.

There are many unanswered questions at the end, so I would not recommend the book to anyone who likes complete closure. Despite its flaws, it is entertaining.

Note: I received a digital galley from the publisher via NetGalley.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an electronic copy to read and review.

I am a huge Ian Hamilton fan - the Ava Lee series and the Uncle books are among my favourites. I had high hopes for this book, but it didn't quite live up to my expectations. The writing was a bit stilted and the story seemed to be pretty choppy. Overall, I like it, but not enough to recommend it.

Family secrets and lies. Jack didn't;t want his family to know that he had been abandoned by his mother in Scotland when he was six years old and later adopted by the Americans they know as his parents. Now, though, he and his wife Anne are back in Scotland to find his past. Turns out there's more to the story than he remembers. HIs sister Moira, a sour puss, informs him that they have two more siblings. This isn't a happy story. There's crime, as can be expected from Hamilton, but it's not a crime novel. I've been a fan of the Ava Lee series but this doesn't have the same spark. Thanks to netgalley for the ARC.

304 pages

3 stars

This is an average story about a man named Jack who is planning retirement. At the age of six he was left in a movie theater by his mother who said she was taking his sister to the bathroom. She didn't come back.

He was adopted by some wonderful people from Boston. They cared for him a great deal, but he has never forgotten the awful pain of being left by his mother. He decides to travel to Scotland with his wife Anne to meet his sister. There he finds a bitter elderly woman who tells him he has another two siblings – twins.

From there he and Anne meet his brother and sister and he likes them immediately. He learns that his father may still be alive and chooses to meet him as well.

This is where the story goes off the rails a bit. While the book certainly held my interest, I was left feeling that I had somehow been cheated. The characters spent a great deal of time getting drunk which disappointed me to no end. The whole lawyer thing upset me as well. I kept wondering if he was just a mouthpiece for the Baxter family. He seemed too shady for my taste. So while it was entertaining, I must say that my overall opinion is that it was shallow.

I want to thank NetGalley and House of Anansi Press Inc/House of Anansi Press for forwarding to me a copy of this book for me to read and review. The opinions expressed here are my own.