Adrenaline

Picking up where he left off in The Guardian, Eidson again uses a kidnapping set in Boston as the vehicle for a nonstop suspense ride. This time, the victims are 30-something couple Steve and Lisa Dern. After boat-manufacturing executive Steve beats out ruthless, thrill-addicted Geoff Mann in a campaign for corporate president of Jansten Associates--then gets him fired for reckless investing--Mann vows revenge. Not only does nutty Mann kidnap Lisa, he turns the ransom-exchange process into a Machiavellian plot to take over much of the Hub's drug trade--and along the way kills two men, the CEO who fired him and an assistant pimp who tries to boss around the hooker who snags Mann's heart. The trail of bodies eventually leads to a mano a mano waterfront confrontation between the two yuppie antagonists, with satisfying if predictable results. Eidson's action scenes are charged with exquisite tension, but the cartoonish Mann too often serves merely as a convenient excuse for notching up the violence. And with a plot and characters so like their counterparts in The Guardian, many readers may find themselves suffering narrative deja vu. (June)