Ladies' Night

A page-turner to the end, this mystery boasts a gripping plot with a psychological twist and debuts a strong, feminist, highly appealing detective. In seemingly unrelated cases, Meg Lacey is hired to find two missing young women, 15-year-old Lillian Kubicek and 19-year-old Alison Chase. Lillian is found dead of a heroin overdose, and Meg believes she can tie the death to Alison's fiance Danny Haswell who owns a nightclub that Meg suspects is a cover for child-pornography and drug rings. What starts as mere guesswork is substantiated when Meg and her friend Johanna, a prostitute, visit the club on ``ladies' night'' and witness debauchery that unnerves even hardened Johanna. Eventually Meg finds someone within Haswell's organization who will supply the necessary details to launch a full-scale police raid, provided that her identity is not revealed. But it all turns sour when the raid results in murderand Meg holds the key to the killer's identity. This Canadian work is a fine addition to Seal's International Women's Crime series. (October)