Vixen
Ken Bruen
St. Martin's, Aug 2005, $12.95, 208 pp.
ISBN: 0312327307

In London, Desk Sergeant Doyle receives the call about the bomb at the Paradise Cinema just before the explosion. The caller tells to cop to provide $300K or more bombs will ignite. The bomb was amateurish consisting of two sticks of dynamite and a simple timer with no one hurt. The second bomb a few days later proved a bit more sophisticated but still amateurish, but the extortion demand doubled.

While the cops like crazy Detective Sergeant Brant search for the bomber, Angie James and her associates the Cross brothers keep the blitz on by raising the ante with each new explosive incident. Angie also works on recruiting disaffected cop P.C. Falls upset for not receiving a promotion. As Brant and James head towards a collision, no one knows who of these two who feel so much alike yet think so differently than most people will survive.

The macabre fascinating Angie freshens the series with her inability to comprehend in terms of right or wrong but instead she feels life is for feeling good and to do that takes her into the realm of the criminal. Readers will enjoy her cat and mouse game with the cops with tough guy Brant her only competition. The storyline is a combination of a police procedural enhanced by the sociopath subplot. Ken Bruen combines that into a terrific thriller starring two adversaries and a support cast burned by contact with either of them.

Harriet Klausner