Too Beautiful to Die

MysteryTOO BEAUTIFUL TO DIEGlenville Lovell. Putnam, $23.95 (296p) ISBN 0-399-15048-X ~ A melodramatic plot and histrionic dialogue, plus some racial and gender stereotyping that some readers may find offensive, tarnish Lovell's (Song of Night) otherwise suspenseful and engaging mystery. Black New York ex-cop Blades Overstreet gets seduced into the dangerous enterprise of helping alluring soap-opera star ""Precious"" find her long-lost father. Since Overstreet is already in the bad graces of the NYPD/FBI for accusing a fellow officer of shooting him ""by accident"" because of his color during a buy-and-bust operation, hostility toward Overstreet skyrockets when he stumbles on a murdered FBI agent. Attempting to grapple with issues of race and ethnic ""otherness,"" the novel overdoes such references and, ironically, undermines their message with slurs such as the assertion that Jamaican women ""prefer to ride the dick all night."" Moreover, the author heaps crude metaphors like ""I didn't realize this shit was going to become hotter than a hooker's ass"" on top of clichEs like ""To taste her was to eat a ripe, full-bodied fig."" In between scenes of repulsively gruesome violence, the male characters brag in the crassest terms about their sexual successes. This is a book for macho crime fans only. (July 10)