Sunrise

Against all odds, this romantic suspense which has little mystery and almost no romance still manages to be a good read. Leigh Ann Warren is an African American Washington, D.C., cop, back in her home town of Sunrise, N.C., after a shooting that left her with a half-inch welt on her scalp and some new revelations about what it means to be a cop. Leigh Ann's return happens to coincide with a reunion of all classes of Sunrise Township School, which is on the verge of being torn down to make room for a shopping mall. The general mood of ill will isn't eased by Leigh Ann's discovery of a long-decomposed body hastily buried in a local cemetary, or by the subsequent murder of the town doctor. Willy-nilly, Leigh Ann is dragged into an investigation of the body's identity, the reasons behind the two murders-and dark talk of skeletons and evil-doings in the purportedly peaceable town. The little romance (one passionate kiss, really) is provided by her friend and partner, who follows Leigh Ann to Sunrise. He's charming, a bit patronizing (of a threat made on Leigh Ann he says ``Nobody messes with my stuff'') and, most of all, unnecessary. The real point of the book is for Leigh Ann to come to grips with her own questions about the direction of her life, and West does this with a good eye for detail and a fine ear for dialogue (Oct.)