Double Helix
Slater Ellis is driving up a remote New Mexico canyon when he stumbles upon a naked teenage boy with a number tattooed on his forehead. Meanwhile, on Florida's Gulf Coast, thirtysomething Paige Stephens picks up her phone and overhears her husband, a genetics researcher, committing suicide. Slater and Paige eventually connect as they penetrate the mystery of the "Institute," a shadowy, quasi-military operation hidden in the New Mexico mountains. The Institute is headed by one Peter Van Klees, a genetics professor who hides behind the good works of a world relief organization to divert fetal tissue from abortion clinics to his DNA research. The feral boy, who turns out to be three identical boys, is a product of that research. When Slater learns of Paige's abduction--into the Institute's macabre maternity ward, where she is impregnated with an experimental fetus--he rescues her and destroys the Institute, but only after he's captured and tortured in a series of visceral scenes. The versatile Brouwer, author of two atypical westerns, has turned in a white-hot performance. On one level,Double Helixis much like a James Bond adventure, complete with Fleming's dour humor; readers may also be reminded of Wells'Island of Dr. Moreau. But additionally, Brouwer vivifies the moral problems DNA research poses and connects them with another red-flag issue, abortion. Word's huge print run suggests confidence in Brouwer's potential to cross over from the Christian market to the mainstream, and they may be right: with impressive control and no preachiness, he has written a scary, maniacal novel.John Mort