The Story Teller

Arapaho attorney Vicky Holden and reservation priest John O'Malley return in their taut fourth adventure (after The Dream Stalker, 1997). This time, they pursue those who will kill to find the missing ""ledger book,"" a record in pictograph of Arapaho presence at an Army massacre of Indians in Colorado. Shortly after the tribe hires Holden to learn why the book apparently disappeared from a Denver museum collection, police find the body of an Arapaho graduate student, Todd Harris. To homicide detectives, Todd's murder looks like a soured drug deal. But Holden, knowing that the student was researching the subject of the ledger book, is convinced that the murder is connected to the book's disappearance. Father John, in Denver to comfort Harris's family, joins Holden in her search for the book. When two friends of Harris are murdered and the house where Holden stays is ransacked, the lawyer and the priest know that their own lives are in danger. All the strengths of this fine series are present here: Coel's knowledge of and respect for western history, a solid mystery with a credible premise in Indian lore and the struggles of Holden and O'Malley with their powerful, but so far unconsummated, attraction to each other. (Oct.) FYI: Berkley Prime Crime will simultaneously publish The Dream Stalker in paper.