Gail Lynn Hanson's Blog: new review
January 11, 2025
So sad...
My heart and prayers go out to those suffering so much loss in Pacific Palisades.
March 7, 2024
Foreword Indies Award Finalist!!
The Palisades has been chosen as a finalist in the General Fiction category for the 2023 INDIES BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARDS.
Check out the link:
https://www.forewordreviews.com/award...
Check out the link:
https://www.forewordreviews.com/award...
February 7, 2024
Print Giveaway - The Palisades
Enter the Goodreads Giveaway for a chance to win a printed copy of my novel, The Palisades. Author-made bookmark included. Ends 2/22/24.
December 7, 2023
Publishers Weekly Review!
Hello Friends,
Please find my Publishers Weekly Review published this morning:
The Palisades
Gail Lynn Hanson. Slippery Fish, $16.95 trade paper (352p) ISBN 979-8-9882874-0-7
Hanson debuts with an impressive and suspenseful tale of the thorny relationship between two unusual women. In 2006, 66-year-old Ruth works as a caregiver for elderly, affluent women in L.A.’s exclusive Pacific Palisades neighborhood. Twenty years ago, Ruth was fired from her job cleaning a nursing home after too many of the residents she got close to died unexpectedly. Ever since, she’s found work as an unlicensed caregiver. Ruth’s latest client is Esther Fiske, a frail, wealthy woman who appears to Ruth to be “filled with blood, leaching fluid and oil.” When Ruth meets Esther’s sister-in-law, Dorothy Anderson, a celebrity-obsessed widow with money to burn and a taste for crime fiction, the two hit it off, and Dorothy hires Ruth as her personal assistant. From there, Hanson keeps readers guessing at each woman’s intentions, gradually ratcheting up the tension until the stakes become truly dangerous. Ruth and Dorothy are remarkably well-drawn characters, nasty and endearing in equal measure, and Hanson provides them with a satisfyingly unpredictable plot. This is a discomfiting good time.
Please find my Publishers Weekly Review published this morning:
The Palisades
Gail Lynn Hanson. Slippery Fish, $16.95 trade paper (352p) ISBN 979-8-9882874-0-7
Hanson debuts with an impressive and suspenseful tale of the thorny relationship between two unusual women. In 2006, 66-year-old Ruth works as a caregiver for elderly, affluent women in L.A.’s exclusive Pacific Palisades neighborhood. Twenty years ago, Ruth was fired from her job cleaning a nursing home after too many of the residents she got close to died unexpectedly. Ever since, she’s found work as an unlicensed caregiver. Ruth’s latest client is Esther Fiske, a frail, wealthy woman who appears to Ruth to be “filled with blood, leaching fluid and oil.” When Ruth meets Esther’s sister-in-law, Dorothy Anderson, a celebrity-obsessed widow with money to burn and a taste for crime fiction, the two hit it off, and Dorothy hires Ruth as her personal assistant. From there, Hanson keeps readers guessing at each woman’s intentions, gradually ratcheting up the tension until the stakes become truly dangerous. Ruth and Dorothy are remarkably well-drawn characters, nasty and endearing in equal measure, and Hanson provides them with a satisfyingly unpredictable plot. This is a discomfiting good time.
September 22, 2023
The Palisades - What is it?
Hello,
Quick update: I just started a 100 Kindle edition giveaway for my forthcoming psychological suspense entitled, the Palisades (pub. 10/24/23).
A while ago, one of my very favorite authors, Kazuo Ishiguro, visited Denver via the Lighthouse Writers Workshop where I've spent a lot of time over the years. A statement that he said stuck with me and went something like this: "When I write a book, I offer something to the reader and say (to myself): This is the way I see it. Do you see it this way too?"
This idea has stayed with me b/c it's also how I feel about my own writing. "Look at what I'm seeing...what do you think of this?"
There have been some great reviews of The Palisades so far. It's been fascinating to hear what readers think. The novel has been described in ways I wouldn't have thought. "Hitchcockian" is one of my favorites. Kirkus describes it as a "Grotesquerie." I like this too.
It's been hard to classify this book and tricky to describe. I'm not good at marketing or "pitching" but authors/publishers are sort of forced to do so if they want to help readers find books they like, so I'm willing to try.
The Palisades is not commercial/mainstream. It's not horror. It's not really a thriller (no chase scenes). It's literary, but not high-brow. It's funny (I hope) but also quite dark. There are moments of suspense. There's a bit of mystery. There are lots of twists.
I'm not helping...
How about this? In the very simplest of terms, if you like watching strange people doing strange things amid really awkward circumstances, then you may like this book.
On a deeper level, this book is about motherhood, mental illness, loneliness, reality/unreality, irony, narcissism, parental devotion, pride, vanity, race, class, gender, religion, art, movies, books, music, materialism, delusion, obsession, God, love, abuse, neglect, connection, escape, loyalty, and maybe a little hope.
This list could go on but I'd love to know your thoughts. Feel free to respond by "asking a question" on my author page.
Quick update: I just started a 100 Kindle edition giveaway for my forthcoming psychological suspense entitled, the Palisades (pub. 10/24/23).
A while ago, one of my very favorite authors, Kazuo Ishiguro, visited Denver via the Lighthouse Writers Workshop where I've spent a lot of time over the years. A statement that he said stuck with me and went something like this: "When I write a book, I offer something to the reader and say (to myself): This is the way I see it. Do you see it this way too?"
This idea has stayed with me b/c it's also how I feel about my own writing. "Look at what I'm seeing...what do you think of this?"
There have been some great reviews of The Palisades so far. It's been fascinating to hear what readers think. The novel has been described in ways I wouldn't have thought. "Hitchcockian" is one of my favorites. Kirkus describes it as a "Grotesquerie." I like this too.
It's been hard to classify this book and tricky to describe. I'm not good at marketing or "pitching" but authors/publishers are sort of forced to do so if they want to help readers find books they like, so I'm willing to try.
The Palisades is not commercial/mainstream. It's not horror. It's not really a thriller (no chase scenes). It's literary, but not high-brow. It's funny (I hope) but also quite dark. There are moments of suspense. There's a bit of mystery. There are lots of twists.
I'm not helping...
How about this? In the very simplest of terms, if you like watching strange people doing strange things amid really awkward circumstances, then you may like this book.
On a deeper level, this book is about motherhood, mental illness, loneliness, reality/unreality, irony, narcissism, parental devotion, pride, vanity, race, class, gender, religion, art, movies, books, music, materialism, delusion, obsession, God, love, abuse, neglect, connection, escape, loyalty, and maybe a little hope.
This list could go on but I'd love to know your thoughts. Feel free to respond by "asking a question" on my author page.
September 10, 2023
Foreword/Clarion Review 5/5
Friends,
I'd like to share another recent review from Foreword/Clarion Reviews:
THE PALISADES
Gail Lynn Hanson
Slippery Fish Press
(322pp)
979-898828740-7
Clarion Rating: 5 out of 5
With a dizzying menagerie of connections, scandals, and misremembered histories that become clearer as the book progresses, The Palisades is a dark tale about the follies of lifelong pity.
A glitz-obsessed caregiver is mired in yesteryear Hollyweird in Gail Lynn Hanson’s dynamic thriller The Palisades. Told through the prism of outdated formalities, the superficiality of social stature, and the triviality of manners and appearance, this is a grim story about inner demons, past transgressions, and the duality of the glamour of midcentury Los Angeles, where those on the outside looking in faced harsh realities.
In the mid-1990s, Ruth lives near Pacific Palisades, an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood. She works with elderly clients who are enjoying the sunsets of their charmed lives. She is hired by Dorothy, a wealthy socialite whose existence has been self-defined by her fringe association with old movie stars, her affinity for all that’s expensive and exotic, and her marriage to well-heeled Eugene. Through a series of abstract meditations that blur the lines between real and unreal, and between surreal and surreptitious, Ruth and Dorothy’s relationship blooms in fits and starts. Their pasts and present are tossed and turned as though in search of the glimmer of fine jewelry.
A deep and introspective novel, The Palisades allows Ruth to make sense of the world through vague, fragmented thoughts that center on comforts meant to calm and define her. She is an obvious victim of trauma, and her longing for the colors, flavors, and guilty pleasures of sloth anchor her substratum of cunning: she manipulates her clients and those around them. She hopes to be soothed by the riches around her—to fill the void where common trust and family love aren’t. Dorothy, on the other hand, tries to make sense of her golden years as a childless widow, enumerating often harsh criticisms of Ruth’s life choices in public and embracing her as close to family in private.
The prose is often claustrophobic and staccato—like voices slithering in and out of one’s consciousness, willing people to move, believe, and understand what’s happening right in front of them on the fly. With a dizzying menagerie of connections, scandals, and misremembered histories that become clearer as the book progresses, The Palisades is a dark tale about the follies of lifelong pity and the perils of memory, loss, and regret. And with its cameos by celebrities including Angela Lansbury, Judy Garland, Carole Landis, and Elvis Presley, it reveals the aesthetics of yesteryear Hollywood glitz as a bright cloak hiding dark secrets.
The Palisades is a hypnotic page-turner that provokes uneasiness and bouts of remorse for deeds undone. It is a book that is painstaking about detailing the minutiae of consumerism, ownership, and superficiality. A psych-horror undercurrent ripples through the story, twisting sentence fragments into moments of profound insight, only to scupper the self-reflection by drowning it beneath a multiverse of internal psychoses. It’s a brilliant peek at the bejeweled ghosts of Hollywood who always keep their secrets hidden.
Reviewed by Ryan Prado
September 8, 2023
I'd like to share another recent review from Foreword/Clarion Reviews:
THE PALISADES
Gail Lynn Hanson
Slippery Fish Press
(322pp)
979-898828740-7
Clarion Rating: 5 out of 5
With a dizzying menagerie of connections, scandals, and misremembered histories that become clearer as the book progresses, The Palisades is a dark tale about the follies of lifelong pity.
A glitz-obsessed caregiver is mired in yesteryear Hollyweird in Gail Lynn Hanson’s dynamic thriller The Palisades. Told through the prism of outdated formalities, the superficiality of social stature, and the triviality of manners and appearance, this is a grim story about inner demons, past transgressions, and the duality of the glamour of midcentury Los Angeles, where those on the outside looking in faced harsh realities.
In the mid-1990s, Ruth lives near Pacific Palisades, an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood. She works with elderly clients who are enjoying the sunsets of their charmed lives. She is hired by Dorothy, a wealthy socialite whose existence has been self-defined by her fringe association with old movie stars, her affinity for all that’s expensive and exotic, and her marriage to well-heeled Eugene. Through a series of abstract meditations that blur the lines between real and unreal, and between surreal and surreptitious, Ruth and Dorothy’s relationship blooms in fits and starts. Their pasts and present are tossed and turned as though in search of the glimmer of fine jewelry.
A deep and introspective novel, The Palisades allows Ruth to make sense of the world through vague, fragmented thoughts that center on comforts meant to calm and define her. She is an obvious victim of trauma, and her longing for the colors, flavors, and guilty pleasures of sloth anchor her substratum of cunning: she manipulates her clients and those around them. She hopes to be soothed by the riches around her—to fill the void where common trust and family love aren’t. Dorothy, on the other hand, tries to make sense of her golden years as a childless widow, enumerating often harsh criticisms of Ruth’s life choices in public and embracing her as close to family in private.
The prose is often claustrophobic and staccato—like voices slithering in and out of one’s consciousness, willing people to move, believe, and understand what’s happening right in front of them on the fly. With a dizzying menagerie of connections, scandals, and misremembered histories that become clearer as the book progresses, The Palisades is a dark tale about the follies of lifelong pity and the perils of memory, loss, and regret. And with its cameos by celebrities including Angela Lansbury, Judy Garland, Carole Landis, and Elvis Presley, it reveals the aesthetics of yesteryear Hollywood glitz as a bright cloak hiding dark secrets.
The Palisades is a hypnotic page-turner that provokes uneasiness and bouts of remorse for deeds undone. It is a book that is painstaking about detailing the minutiae of consumerism, ownership, and superficiality. A psych-horror undercurrent ripples through the story, twisting sentence fragments into moments of profound insight, only to scupper the self-reflection by drowning it beneath a multiverse of internal psychoses. It’s a brilliant peek at the bejeweled ghosts of Hollywood who always keep their secrets hidden.
Reviewed by Ryan Prado
September 8, 2023
August 30, 2023
New Review
Hello Readers,
Here is a review (in part) I just received from Blueink Review.
"Hanson’s literary novel skillfully holds a mirror to the darker aspects of the human psyche. Both
Dorothy and Ruth are held hostage by their disappointments and painful regrets. At face value,
neither are “likable” characters. Dorothy is unapologetically judgmental, classist, and racist.
Ruth’s distressing personal history evokes sympathy, but she’s also manipulative and
untrustworthy; after droves of patients died under her watch, Ruth was fired from her job at a
state-run nursing home. Yet Hanson ably crafts an emotionally rich narrative that builds on the
tension simmering between Dorothy and Ruth.
Anchored by Hanson’s deft character construction, this compelling story holds all the appeal of
a Hitchcockian psychological thriller, and the cinematic ending will hit readers like a punch to the gut."
Here is a review (in part) I just received from Blueink Review.
"Hanson’s literary novel skillfully holds a mirror to the darker aspects of the human psyche. Both
Dorothy and Ruth are held hostage by their disappointments and painful regrets. At face value,
neither are “likable” characters. Dorothy is unapologetically judgmental, classist, and racist.
Ruth’s distressing personal history evokes sympathy, but she’s also manipulative and
untrustworthy; after droves of patients died under her watch, Ruth was fired from her job at a
state-run nursing home. Yet Hanson ably crafts an emotionally rich narrative that builds on the
tension simmering between Dorothy and Ruth.
Anchored by Hanson’s deft character construction, this compelling story holds all the appeal of
a Hitchcockian psychological thriller, and the cinematic ending will hit readers like a punch to the gut."
August 19, 2023
Forthcoming Novel - The Palisades
Hello to all those interested in learning about and hopefully reading my forthcoming, debut novel, The Palisades.
Since The Palisades is forthcoming, I do not have many reader reviews, but I do have a few to share from Kirkus, Midwest Book Review, and a handful of kind readers from Readers' Favorites. I'll share those, in part, here:
"A wonderfully claustrophobic tale of obsession and self-delusion... The author excels at acclimating the reader to the logic of her characters, which is effectively deployed for moments of both repulsion and humor... Hanson deftly conveys how celebrity fandom becomes its own sort of grotesquerie for all involved; the twists are many and fun, but there's a real darkness here that sticks with the reader after the book is finished."
Kirkus Reviews
full review: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-re...
"Gail Lynn Hanson demonstrates an exceptional ability to immerse the reader n the minds of her characters.
Hanson effectively captures the absurdity of celebrity fandom but also delves into the darker aspects of the phenomenon.
Overall, the book is a rollercoaster ride of twists and turns that is sure to leave a lasting impression on readers."
Midwest Book Review
"Hanson brought back my love of psychological thrillers. Bravo!"
Readers's Favorites
"The laser-like focus on a particularly nuanced and emotionally dynamic relationship... Hanson demonstrates a quite profound gift for human observation..."
Readers's Favorites
"The intricate dance that the two (characters) perform throughout the book tingles with electricity...the lines between honesty and manipulation get ever more blurred. Overall, The Palisades is an unmissable character study that will stay with readers for a long time after the final page is turned. I recommend it highly."
Readers's Favorites
Next, a bit about myself that was not included in the bio. I've been writing for twenty years. This will be my first published novel. I'm not a big social media-type person so much of the "setting up" of profiles and websites was nearly as difficult as writing the novel, and a lot less fun!
I will also say that The Palisades is a difficult book to categorize, yet we (authors) are forced to do so, and I do understand the benefit of this for readers to find books etc. However, I love the mixing and overlap of genres and while I didn't set out to achieve this, I believe The Palisades is a truly unique thing appealing to both readers of literary fiction as well as fans of domestic and/or psychological suspense, noir, and those readers who just like watching quirky characters put in really weird situations.
I welcome reviews and comments and I also have no friends or groups yet! Not yet sure how to do this bc I feel like I'm inviting myself to a party, late...
Thanks in advance to all those who support indie writers and publishers because we all have things to say and oftentimes fiction is the best way to tell the truth!
Since The Palisades is forthcoming, I do not have many reader reviews, but I do have a few to share from Kirkus, Midwest Book Review, and a handful of kind readers from Readers' Favorites. I'll share those, in part, here:
"A wonderfully claustrophobic tale of obsession and self-delusion... The author excels at acclimating the reader to the logic of her characters, which is effectively deployed for moments of both repulsion and humor... Hanson deftly conveys how celebrity fandom becomes its own sort of grotesquerie for all involved; the twists are many and fun, but there's a real darkness here that sticks with the reader after the book is finished."
Kirkus Reviews
full review: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-re...
"Gail Lynn Hanson demonstrates an exceptional ability to immerse the reader n the minds of her characters.
Hanson effectively captures the absurdity of celebrity fandom but also delves into the darker aspects of the phenomenon.
Overall, the book is a rollercoaster ride of twists and turns that is sure to leave a lasting impression on readers."
Midwest Book Review
"Hanson brought back my love of psychological thrillers. Bravo!"
Readers's Favorites
"The laser-like focus on a particularly nuanced and emotionally dynamic relationship... Hanson demonstrates a quite profound gift for human observation..."
Readers's Favorites
"The intricate dance that the two (characters) perform throughout the book tingles with electricity...the lines between honesty and manipulation get ever more blurred. Overall, The Palisades is an unmissable character study that will stay with readers for a long time after the final page is turned. I recommend it highly."
Readers's Favorites
Next, a bit about myself that was not included in the bio. I've been writing for twenty years. This will be my first published novel. I'm not a big social media-type person so much of the "setting up" of profiles and websites was nearly as difficult as writing the novel, and a lot less fun!
I will also say that The Palisades is a difficult book to categorize, yet we (authors) are forced to do so, and I do understand the benefit of this for readers to find books etc. However, I love the mixing and overlap of genres and while I didn't set out to achieve this, I believe The Palisades is a truly unique thing appealing to both readers of literary fiction as well as fans of domestic and/or psychological suspense, noir, and those readers who just like watching quirky characters put in really weird situations.
I welcome reviews and comments and I also have no friends or groups yet! Not yet sure how to do this bc I feel like I'm inviting myself to a party, late...
Thanks in advance to all those who support indie writers and publishers because we all have things to say and oftentimes fiction is the best way to tell the truth!
