No Way Back

Baltimore cop Luther Ewing, having just received a six-month suspension from his narc squad job, takes on a CIA mission to fill the down time. An ex–Special Forces spook with a long history of mass mayhem, Luther's now headed for a dicey bodyguarding scenario in Korea and Vladivostok. He suffers from a head wound that forces him to take medication four times a day, but the injury hasn't dulled his impressive skills. He's a master of any number of weapons systems, but the book, the third in a series (Red Rain ; The Bite ), focuses mostly on the setup and training for the mission. His controllers are two beauties, Nadya and Allison, and an old partner from his Bosnian days, Westley. Their job is to protect a wealthy South Korean making a mysterious deal with a pair of devious Russian generals. As always in these sorts of adventures, double-crosses, triple-crosses and more are expected and supplied. The real fun is in trying to figure out who's in charge, what the real game is and how to tell the good guys from the bad. Luther performs with his usual deadly grace, and Crow lays it all out with style and strength. The action takes a while to arrive, but once there it's swift, brutal and rewarding. Agent, Jane Dystel . (June)