Kingdoms

To truly enjoy Salk's fictional debut, readers must be like Lewis Carroll's Red Queen--able to believe six impossible things before breakfast. Once past the obstacle of its improbable plot, however, they will find this romantic suspense story enlivened by a fine cast of supporting characters. Beautiful, brainy Claire Barrow was raised in a dirt-poor Kentucky coal town and educated at Georgetown. She is a rising star in the class-conscious Washington, D.C., society of the 1960s when she meets Tarik, the smolderingly handsome heir to the throne of an impoverished Arab country. They elope to his homeland, where Claire becomes involved in modernization efforts while Tarik attempts to quell a rebellion by rival chiefs. When violence and intrigue shatter their idyll, they part; pregnant, Claire returns to the U.S. and marries kindly, aristocratic Lawrence Sayres, who has always loved her. Tiring of her trivial social duties, she buys a coal mine in her native state; meanwhile, Tarik's nation becomes immensely wealthy due to the discovery of oil. Circumstances bring Claire and Tarik together again in a violently suspenseful conclusion. Salk's plot stretches credulity beyond the breaking point, but her strong portrayals of the secondary characters--far more interesting and credible than the protagonists--make this a good first effort. ( Apr. )