Now You See Me

Bolton's fourth thriller, a complex psychological puzzler, stands head and shoulders above other such efforts featuring a modern copycat Jack the Ripper. On the anniversary of the original Ripper's first killing, Det. Constable Lacey Flint is horrified to find a dying woman, "her abdomen... a mass of scarlet," leaning against the detective's car in a London car park. The guilt-ridden Flint wonders whether different actions on her part might have saved the victim's life or caught the killer. The connection with the 1888 autumn of terror becomes clear after a journalist receives a letter obviously derived from some of the correspondence Scotland Yard received back then, ostensibly from the Ripper himself. By coincidence, Flint is something of a Ripper expert, and her knowledge proves useful in what develops into a multiple murder investigation. Avoiding gratuitous violence, Bolton (Blood Harvest) skillfully plays with the reader's expectations. Minette Walters fan will be pleased. (June)