Icy Clutches

Physical anthropologist Gideon Oliver, earlier seen in Edgar-winner Old Bones , resumes his forensic sleuthing in this well-intentioned but wordy yarn. Having joined his wife on a professional junket to Alaska, Oliver is Johnny-on-the-spot when the survivors of a 1960 expedition discover bones. The leader, botanist M. Audley Tremaine, returns nearly 30 years later to unveil his book about the ill-fated trek to Tirku Glacier to the one other survivor, Walter Judd, and the relatives of those lost in an avalanche. But the remains of a skull found on the glacier reveal to Oliver that an ice pick had pierced it before the avalanche struck. Though Tremaine ostensibly hangs himself after hearing this news, Oliver suspects the scientist has been murdered. When Tremaine's manuscript and then the skeletal fragments are stolen, Oliver and the FBI have only the memories of Judd and the relatives to work with. The intrepid ``skeleton detective'' is nevertheless able to wrest the truth about the events on Tirku from its ``icy clutches.'' But the repetitive scientific analysis and an overwrought narrative dull the novel's potential for suspense. (Sept.)