The Viking Funeral: A Shane Scully Novel
Stephen J. Cannell has taken to heart Raymond Chandler's remark about  writing crime fiction. "When in doubt," Chandler advised, "have a man come  through a door with a gun in his hand." There are so many bullets flying inThe Viking Funeralthat readers might be forgiven for missing this  author's subtler efforts to fill out the dimensions of his series protagonist,  LAPD Detective Shane Scully, introduced in 2001'sThe Tin Collectors.Nobody believes Scully when he says he's just seen Jody Dean (his boyhood buddy  and former colleague, who supposedly committed suicide two years before)  speeding down a freeway. So the detective sets out to prove that Dean is alive,  only to fall in with a crew of undercover cops who've slipped their leash and  are now running a convoluted money-laundering scheme that ties U.S. tobacco  shipments to South American drug barons.Cannell, the creator of TV series such asThe Rockford FilesandWiseguy, certainly knows how to choreograph an action scene. But his  dialogue is occasionally stilted, andThe Viking Funeralloses some  narrative steam during a lengthy tour of tropical hideouts. The story is at its  best in illuminating the deceptive friendship between the emotionally scarred  Scully and the arrogant Dean. Fans ofThe Tin Collectorsshouldn't be  disappointed.--J. Kingston Pierce