Shadow Image

Smith brings back psychologist Jim Christensen (Time Release) in an obvious whodunit set against a truly engaging background of art therapy used to aid Alzheimer's patients. Christensen and his lover Brenna Kennedy, the knockout defense attorney, are caught in the maelstrom when the matriarch of the powerful Underhill family, Floss Underhill, goes over a railing on the family estate. Floss is in the late stages of Alzheimer's, so it is through her paintings that the duo hope to unravel the secrets behind Floss's ""accident."" The scenes at the Harmony Brain Research Center are fascinating, but unfortunately, Smith's plotting plods, with Jim and Brenna often two steps behind any reader who's ever seen or read a mystery. (July)