Assessment:
Plot: This relationship-driven story proves gripping from the very start. Readers will gain a clear and intimate understanding of the power couple at the book’s center, as well as the events and circumstances that have led to their conflicts.
Prose: The well-crafted prose supports the dramatic events and allows readers to become easily invested in the storytelling.
Originality: Events keep readers guessing as Kranz brings the sympathetic primary characters to a breaking point.
Character/Execution: Both Bud and Maggie have captivating personalities that drive the narrative. The author excels in character development, extending to intriguing and full side characters that benefit the overarching story.
Date Submitted: July 26, 2021
By JOHN MOONEY
Published July 6, 2021 at 3:10 PM
Last UpdatedJuly 11, 2021 at 11:21 PM
FANWOOD, NJ —Fanwood author Tom Kranz’s new novel, Bud & Maggie’s Secrets, provides a coda to the exploits of Bud and Maggie Remmick, the subjects of two previous novels in which the couple faces evil forces that cause murder, corruption and other crises.
The book is the final installment of a trilogy. In the first, Budland, Bud kills his news director boss in a pique of rage, goes to prison, gets out on a sweet plea bargain and resumes his past life in TV. Maggie, long-suffering yet loyal, survives her husband’s incarceration but only barely, victimized by coworkers and relentless bills while she struggles to keep solvent on the salary of a meals-on-wheels provider.
In the novel Killer Competition, the Remmicks find peace and new lives in rural Pennsylvania, Bud as a news director at a Philadelphia TV station, Maggie as executive director of her county Department of Senior Services. Bud discovers one of his news photographers is committing crimes, including murder, and videotaping them. Maggie is tipped by an old acquaintance that the governor of Pennsylvania is gunning for her job to allow a patronage hack to fill her position. She is also troubled by her curious attraction to a female co-worker who becomes her mentor and protector. In the end there is a confluence of evil which threatens the couple’s new life.
In Bud and Maggie’s Secrets, the couple is faced with their most complex challenges yet–their own secrets. While outwardly devoted to each other, each struggles to keep secrets that are undermining the marriage. Bud, now the mayor of rural Armitage, is targeted in a shooting spree during a town council meeting that leads to a shocking revelation. The collateral damage threatens Maggie, appointed Secretary of Aging for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, whose job is in jeopardy once again because of Bud. Each has someone in their life who has changed their day-to-day dynamic and forced them to lie to each other. As the lies compound, the tension builds.
“Fans of the first two Bud and Maggie novels may be shocked at the secrets they are keeping,” said Kranz. “But I look at it as the evolution of characters as they mature and are better able to assess their own truths and live their lives accordingly.”
Tom Kranz will sign copies of Bud & Maggie’s Secrets and his other books on Friday, July 16, 5-7 p.m. at the Fanwood Larder (44B S. Martine Ave., Fanwood). His novels are also available on Amazon in paperback and e-book. The first two are also available as audiobooks. For more info, visit tomkranzbooks.com.
