Otherworld

Even the environmental warning underlying this dark novel cannot redeem its silly premise, which combines scientific theory with Celtic myth. Flint ( Cromm ) offers a preponderance of action and theatrical effects, including a seance, haunted house and UFO chase scene. pk Phillip Buckley has been researching a dramatic increase in the number of ``supernatural events''--serial killers who think the devil made them do it, for instance--when he becomes the victim of such a killer. Kurt Dalstrom pk blazes a gory path from his rural Minnesota home to Denver to gun down Buckley, a complete stranger, when pk Buckley is visiting his former professor, Richard Jordan. Robert Cassiday, Buckley's college chum and now a ``clandestine operations'' government agent, appears at Jordan's home, determined to investigate the murder. The men learn from Buckley's notes that he was studying parapsychology and the occult. Soon joined by Ann Archer, an artist who sees Buckley's murder replayed in her nightmares, the men follow Buckley's research trail in a desperate effort to prevent the hostile forces of the Otherworld from taking over the earth. (Jan.)