Amethyst

Mary-Rose Hayes, Mary-Rose Hayes. Onyx Books, $5.5 (464pp) ISBN 978-0-451-40224-0

The lives of four female friends are spanned from English boarding school to their fated reunion 20 years later. ``Hayes keeps readers plowing along doggedly, then supplies a sordid ending that makes gratuitous, moralistic use of AIDS,'' complained PW . (Dec.)

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