From Publishers Weekly
Boasting more beatings per page than a Philip Marlowe story, this complex mystery stars ruminative Yonkers PI Jack Paine, an unjustly fired cop. During the worst heat wave in 34 years, Paine is torn away from his fat Gore Vidal novel, his Keith Jarrett records and his fishing gear by a call from the wife of his old police buddy, Bobby Petty. She reports that Bobby has deserted her and their young daughters, has stolen the girls' college funds and has phoned to warn her that he'll kill them all if she comes after him. Up to now, the couple had seemed to be models for a Norman Rockwell painting; Paine believes that Petty, who had been working on a drug case, had "deliberately, and coldly, cut the roots from his own soul." A scrap of paper with a flight number leads Paine to Dallas and to the first of half a dozen savagely butchered bodies. Suspicion immediately falls on Petty, increasing as the rest of the victims are identified as his Marine comrades from Vietnam. Drugs, betrayal and corruption at the highest levels figure in a story that stretches the bounds of credibility but provides a satisfying, even shocking, climax. Sarrantonio also wrote Cold Night.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
When her husband Bobby, a Yonkers cop, goes out for ice cream one hot night and never comes back--pausing in his flight only long enough to make an abusive 4 a.m. phone call and clean out their bank accounts--Terry Petty calls Bobby's old friend and former colleague, stargazing shamus Jack Paine (who debuted in Cold Night, 1989). Following a trail of beheaded corpses, Paine eventually ties Bobby in to an off-the-books DEA covert operation in Cambodia--and to a finger- waving indictment of just about everybody who's ever held a public trust. ``This thing makes Iran-Contra look like baby puke,'' warns Paine's pal Billy Rader--but the writing, the plotting, and the people here are so routine that they scarcely make an impression apart from the frequency and ferocity of the violence. Sleep well, America. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
