The Job

This new caper, featuring by-the-book FBI Agent Kate O’Hare and raffish playboy/thief Nick Fox, sends the crime-busting odd couple across the globe squabbling and searching for a mysterious international drug lord they hope to swindle and put away. Following the only available clue to his identity—an addiction to Knipschildt chocolates—they get close enough to put themselves in jeopardy not just with him and his sadistic significant other, but with an assortment of bizarre and sinister types, including a vicious bodyguard who follows the advice of the preserved head of one of his Portuguese ancestors. Though the authors have not given the picked head any dialogue, robbing reader Brick of the opportunity of creating something profoundly original, they have included FBI agents and criminals with an assortment of accents, from Southern to Spanish. It’s Brick’s narrative style to keep such inflections subtle. His main focus is on Fox and O’Hare: her voice has a hard edge that softens slightly only during her unguarded moments with Nick, while his remains wryly amused and playful until he senses Kate is in danger. Brick has no problem following the authors’ lead, revving up the pace during the thrilling sequences, leveling off after the cliffhanger escapes, and lightening up during the moments when the couple is bickering. [em]A Bantam hardcover. (Nov.) [/em]