cover image Frailties

Frailties

Nancy Geyer. Little Brown and Company, $0 (448pp) ISBN 978-0-316-30892-2

Lance Benton, founder of Dallas's thriving Arch Theatre, is, at age 46, successful, admired, and married to a beautiful, intelligent woman. Still, boredom, his lifelong malaise, has all but overwhelmed him. For a nerve-tingling new life, no obligations, and a cool million dollars, he has no scruples about stepping on principles and people. Sandra Lowrey, a gum-popping young actress convinced that Lance will marry her as soon as he can afford his wife's alimony, is his pawn. She's to seduce five members of the Arch's wealthy directorial board: they'll be filmed on the VCR Lance has installed over her bed, and then he'll blackmail them for all they're worth. Five are lured into the trap, but predictably, things don't go according to plan. While one pays up, another delivers only Monopoly money, a third commits suicide, a fourth tries to blackmail the blackmailer, and the wealthiest of all expires in situ, at which point, Lance puts an end to Sandra's rebelliousness by doing her in as well. By now, of course, his doom is sealed. Replete with money, sex, and hijinks, Geyer's second novel (Flying South) has the scope of a TV dramabut not the character development or devious, unexpected twists of a really effective one. Foreign rights:Virginia Barber. January 14