Blood Rules

In a new twist on the airline hijacking plot, Trenhaile ( Krysalis ) spins a story of a terrorist mother. In 1984, two years after Leila Hanif deserted them upon being revealed as an undercover operative, Colin Raleigh and his 14-year-old son, Robbie, are bound for Australia when Shia Muslims seize the aircraft and force its pilot to land in the isolated Yemen desert. The mingling of Leila's personal motivations with the Shias' political goal of exchanging the plane's passengers for six Iraqi-held Iranians make her something of a loose cannon. Also on board is a Mossad agent bent on revenge against Leila, whose first terrorist act caused his young daughter's death and his wife's subsequent suicide. The fate of all may rest on the efforts of Leila's grandmother, Celestine, long an opponent of her family's terrorist activities. Against the larger issues of parents and children and the sacrificing of one for the other remains the question of who will live and who will die in the desert. Readers may be surprised and shocked by the answer. (Oct.)