cover image Veil of Secrets

Veil of Secrets

Una-Mary Parker. Dutton Books, $18.95 (342pp) ISBN 978-0-453-00722-1

British blueblood Parker's romantic suspense novel will hold few surprises for fans of the genre. Madeleine Delaney, beautiful, moneyed and a fabulously successful New York artist, receives a late-night phone call from her estranged maternal grandfather, a member of the Devon gentry. Responding to his mysterious request that she come to England as soon as possible, Madeleine discovers that her supposedly long-dead mother may in fact be alive, and that untold machinations within her family have kept the truth from her for years. Meanwhile Carl, Madeleine's sexy, sun-tanned husband, gets caught up in an embezzlement plot set up by his tarty secretary, the nefarious Kimberley Cabot of Maspeth, Queens. And Madeleine's best friend Jessica, a hostess at London's finest hotel, turns down marriage to pursue her career, then falls desperately in love with another man. This opus by the author of Scandals and Riches , both bestsellers in England, is as cliche-ridden and formulaic as they come. Moreover, its archness and snobbery toward all things American, given the novel's ignorance of U.S. customs, society and language, may be odious to readers on this side of the Atlantic. (Apr.)