Whitcoulls Recommends: Nemesis and The House of My Mother

Nemesis by Gregg Hurwitz. This is a story in the Orphan X sequence, which I’ve loved from the very beginning, but this one takes a darker and more personal turn for Evan Smoak, the hero. Because of the nature of his work and the man he was made to be to do that work he’s never had friends, but 15 years ago he met a man who became the nearest thing to being a friend – Tommy Stojack – a former gunrunner and Green Beret who now supplies arms and equipment to Evan – but who now betrays him, and friendship rapidly turns to enmity. This is a brilliant thriller.   

The House of My Mother by Shari Franke. Shari was one of six children in a family which became known on YouTube as 8 Passengers. Her mother Ruby turned her family into performance and filmed and posted everything about their lives, portraying them as being the perfect family when behind the scenes they were anything but. Ruby was a really tough Mum off camera, but when she took up with a relationship coach their abuse of the children escalated, and Ruby and Jodi, the coach, are now serving prison time. This is their story by the eldest daughter. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News talks'b In.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Joining me now to talk books is Joan McKenzie. Good morning, Hello,
Greg Hurwitz. Very popular author and I know a favorite
of yours.

Speaker 3 (00:20):
Yeah, I love his books. I always say, if you
like Jack Reacher, then you will like this guy. He's
written a series of books called Orphan X, and this
is the tenth in that series. But he's kind of
morphed it as he's gone along, because he was Orphan
X for quite a long time and then he became
the nowhere Man, and in this new book, he's moved
on from that to almost an entirely other plane, and

(00:41):
it's just brilliant. The nowhere Man was someone who helped
people who got into trouble, and then he gave him
his phone number and said, when you find someone who
needs me, give them this number and I will get
in there and look after them. That's what he was doing.
But because of the way that he lives, he was
brought up in a camp for orphans where he was

(01:01):
taught all the black ops for becoming a government assassin.
And it all sounds toarribly far fetched, but it absolutely
works in these books. He's always been very much alone,
never really had a friend, and the descriptions of the
way he lives have always been fantastically entertaining. He lives
in this seven thousand square foot penthouse, which on the
outside looks like all of the others, but his security

(01:22):
arrangements have things like the steel interior of his door
has a water core inside it so that a battering
ram couldn't get through the door, and once you're inside,
it's completely over the top security, but just brilliant in
this book, I'll just quickly say My favorite and almost
hard to believe, is that he wears a jacket which

(01:43):
has magnetic buttons which help him get to his holster faster,
and he has an adverserial pattern woven into the design,
which apparently adds a storm of pixel noise to fuzz
the criteria by which AI could recognize him and makes
them invisible to his enemies. How useful is that?

Speaker 2 (01:59):
It's very useful?

Speaker 3 (02:01):
So anyway, no friends Until fifteen years ago, he meets
a guy called Tommy Stojak, who was an ex Green
Beret and a former gunrunner, and he becomes the main
source of supply for Evans' weapons and equipment, and they're
closest brothers, but in this book, Tom has violated Evans's
very strict moral code, which results in all out warfare

(02:22):
between them. It's really good, Okay, So it's almost sort
of a bit more of a personal internal story. It is. Yes,
it is as very much as I said, it's moved
to another plane, and it is very much from the
personal perspective of Evans' values and the way that he
thinks he should live his life.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
Okay, that's good. I mean, when you're on your tenth book,
you've got to kind of keep it moving on, don't you. Yeah,
And it certainly as okay, love it. The House of
my mother Vy Shari Frank tell me about this. Shari
was one of six children in a family, the Frank family,
which became know one on YouTube as eight Passengers, and
her mother got a thing for YouTube when she realized
that she could monetize things, so she started to film

(02:59):
the family and she posted everything about the family on
this YouTube channel called eight Passengers, being the six kids
and the two parents, and these kids' lives were put
up there as post a children, post a family for
the most perfect family, and behind the scenes it was
anything but her mother was increasingly brutal and remote and difficult,

(03:21):
and when she eventually took up with someone who termed
herself a relationship coach. Her name was Jodi, the two
of them got into khurtz and became so far removed
from reality that the abuse that they perpetrated on, particularly
the younger kids in this family was absolutely outrageous. And
I can say now that the mother and the relationship

(03:42):
coach are in prison doing a prison sentence, and Shari,
who was the eldest of the children, who was in
her early twenties, has written this book about what it
was actually like to grow up in that family. Sounds
a bit grim, Joe. It is a bit grim, sort
of opened at the end of the tunnel, right at

(04:02):
the end of the tunnel.

Speaker 3 (04:03):
Yes, there is, because Shari's got out and managed to
start to make a life for herself and she will
make sure that her siblings are fine. But I think
what it is is it's a kind of a warning,
cautionary note about what you see online and what you
believe about what you see online, and the dangers that
are sometimes hidden there. That it's really important that people

(04:25):
understand that not everything you see is as it looks interesting.

Speaker 2 (04:29):
Thank you so much, Joan. The two books Nemesis by
Greg Hurwitz and the second book There Was The House
of My Mother by Shari Frank. You're with the News
Talks ITB Talk next week, John, See you then.

Speaker 1 (04:45):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin. Listen
live to News Talks it Be from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio