The Broken Hearts Club

This well-paced psycho-thriller debut about a group of lovelorn New York City men manages to transcend occasionally awkward prose on the strength of journalist Black's unusual ability to arouse an emotional response. The Broken Hearts Club (whose members include the Banker, the Mechanic, the Agent and the Reluctant Patient, who never shows up) is a therapy group of rejected suitors that meets each Thursday in the back room of a tavern overlooking the West Side Highway, facilitated by psychologist Dr. Ian Bainbridge, who collects case histories to use in articles that enhance his professional standing. The processing of their unresolved rage plays out in the brutal murder of The Banker's former mistress. Meanwhile, the idyllic affair of NYPD's richest cop, detective Conrad Voort, with the beautiful, erotic Camilla Ryan, suddenly falls apart. As the ""BHC"" murders continue, a hotline call from an ""anonymous"" doctor directs Voort to investigate The Banker. But after a promising start, the trail seems to vanish into thin air. Time after time, other heartening clues lead to a dead end. When Camilla wrongly accuses Voort of stalking her, the paradoxical trail leads back to Bainbridge, and the fiendish machinations among the characters force a so-so denouement. Black fashions some terrific dialogue and keeps the scenes rolling in punchy succession. The iconoclastic Voort could well augur the advent of a sexy, savvy, highly charismatic new icon in popular crime fiction, if Black pays better attention to crafting. Major ad/promo; Literary Guild, Doubleday Book Club, Mystery Guild selections. (Feb.)