Walk on the Water

J. D. Hawkins, amateur sleuth and writer of police procedurals, returns from Paint It Black to help his wife, Megan, a book editor, fend off a threatened lawsuit against her employer. One of Megan's authors, Fiona Darling, is accused of plagiarizing a manuscript penned by a famous writer of hardboiled detective fiction, Howard Holton, recently killed in a fishing accident off Nantucket. Because his body hasn't been found, Howard has not been declared legally dead, an eventuality frustrating the financial ambitions of his wealthy widow, a hotelier on the order of Ivana Trump. Believing her husband may have faked his death, the widow hopes to smoke him out with the lawsuit and the suggestion of an affair between him and Fiona. To help Megan keep her job and her reputation, the wheelchair-bound Hawkins maneuvers gracefully through his native Boston and the congested streets of New York City, assuming his own fair share of danger as he interviews an array of suspects. Philbrick delivers an entirely pleasant mystery, genuinely nice characters and adequate doses of suspense and innovation. (Mar.)