Grand Delusion

The recent recipient of $1 million for a screenplay, resident amateur detective Jake Burns is back in the second installment (after Breakfast at Madeline's) of Witten's series of happenstance mystery novels. Jake's avocation of the moment is the preservation of his seedy neighborhood in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., saving it from the likes of neighboring drug dealers who keep Burns's family--including his kids, six-year-old Babe Ruth and preschooler Wayne Gretzky--awake nights. Burns is frustrated that, even with a smart police chief like Lia Kalmus, every single member of the local department seems corrupt, including the owner of the drug house next door, Pop Doyle, an officer with several scams going (prostitution, drugs and payoffs, to name a few). When Pop is shot, Jake becomes a suspect and is arrested. Released on bond, he tries to solve the murder and watches related homicides stack up, with crooked cops the only likely perps. The endless shifts in presumed guilty cops and the oppressive local politics get wearisome after a while, but Witten delights with his charming characters--especially Burns himself, who at one point renames his children Leonardo and Raphael, presumably due to a newfound interest in art. (Jan.)