cover image Mall Rats: A Stick Foster Mystery

Mall Rats: A Stick Foster Mystery

Kevin Robinson. Walker & Company, $19.95 (197pp) ISBN 978-0-8027-3215-6

A wheelchair wedding kicks of Robinson's ( Split Seconds ) somewhat disappointing second Stick Foster mystery. Paraplegic Florida journalist Stick, the groom, and his ravishing lawyer bride (also wheelchair-bound) are upstaged when an elderly woman in the congregation dies from punch laced with ``crack, PCP and amphetamine.'' Suspicion instantly falls on six other wedding guests--the troubled adolescents, called mall rats, whom Stick befriended while doing a ``mall life'' newspaper series. Also present are a young man who suffers from Downs syndrome, a graying FBI agent, an entire wheelchair basketball team and many more of Stick's mixed bag of pals. A story so filled with love and respect for those who are different from the societal norms--minorities, deprived youngsters, the mentally and physically handicapped--and packing a hefty dollop of adventure, too, seems likely to engage the reader. But there are too many characters, indistinctly portrayed, and too much gratuitous activity delaying a nevertheless rousing climax. Also on the plus side: Robinson, disabled himself, gives a graphic account of the technicalities of life in a wheelchair. Author tour. (June)