cover image Tygers of Wrath

Tygers of Wrath

Philip Rosenberg. St. Martin's Press, $19.95 (391pp) ISBN 978-0-312-05528-8

Rosenberg's ( Badge of Assassin ) latest novel may evoke comparisons to the '50s bestseller Blackboard Jungle , although the writing here is denser and the canvas larger. Timothy Warren, a gifted but disturbed Bronx junior high student, holds hostage birdlike 13-year-old Ophelia James, as Steven Hillyer, a caring but fearful teacher in a school system where drugs, violence and sex are rampant, tries to convince him to free her. The police arrive; Ophelia dies by asphyxiation, Timothy from a cop's bullet. The explosive impact of the cruel, senseless deaths reaches to the Board of Education, spills over onto the police department with its policy of protecting its own, scalds the mayor and inflames a black leader, who uses the incident to his own advantage. Without being pedantic, Rosenberg has written a strong, gritty thriller that dramatizes the many undersides of the inner city. Movie rights to Jaffe/Lansing/Paramount; Literary Guild selection. (Feb.)