The Edge of Sleep
Dee is a manic-depressive, persuasive, apparently bright woman; Ash is large and lumbering, slow of speech and mind. Together, they torture and kill young boys. Former FBI agent John Becker, himself a survivor of child abuse (and hero of Prayer for the Dead , Putnam, 1991), reluctantly joins his ex-lover Karen Crist, who still works for the Bureau, in the hunt for the boys' killers. This grim tale of emotionally maimed people is unredeemed by suspense; the reader knows from the beginning things that the agents are slow to discover and will be annoyed by overlooked clues discovered just in time. Of course Agent Crist is a single mother, terrified of the dangers that may face her own young son, and of course those dangers come to pass. There is simply no one to like in this story, except possibly the young victims; but pity does not substitute for the chill generated by a truly suspenseful narrative. Save your fiction dollars.- Elsa Pendleton, Boeing Computer Support Svcs., Ridge crest, Cal.Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.