Burn Season

Jack Lacey runs a nightclub in Costa Rica, where the troubles of Central America threaten to destroy his business as this intriguing police procedural opens. A New Yorker who fought with the Sandinistas, Jack believes the contras have it in for him when a car bomb goes off outside the club. Topo, a patron killed in the bombing, was a Sandinista who had asked Jack for refuge. But Topo was also a low-life whom anyone might have wanted dead. Police inspector Eddie Santos suspects that Jack isn't telling him all he knows, and Jack suspects that beautiful Nicaraguan diplomat Lucia Lara, wealthy fat man Pepe Esparaza and American diplomat Richard Akers aren't being forthcoming either about ensuing killings. But Akers, Jack learns, is CIA, and Jack's own investigations put his life in added danger. With its Casablancan ambience and characters, and reporterly detail, Lantigua's second novel fulfils the promise of Heat Lightning , and is another darkly gripping read. (Oct.)