Stolen Flower

Except for Nero Wolfe, private eyes who own New York townhouses strike a false note almost instantly, and when P.I.narrator Frank DeNardo tells us he has espresso, toast and papaya for breakfast, readers' suspicions should be roused. Ex-cop DeNardo is hired to find the 10-year-old granddaughter of a theatrical magnate. Valerie Sommers vanished months ago in Naples, but now her picture appears in a Dutch kiddie-porn magazine. DeNardo hares off to Amsterdam, finds and rescues Valerie, then loses her in a re-abduction in Munich. With help from a Mafia don in Naplesa friend of his powerful ""uncle'' in the StatesDeNardo tracks the slavers to Ibiza. Pretty, blonde Valerie is being held there awaiting marriage to a rich Arab and, presumably, a fate worse than death. Some readers may find this titillating, but most will consider it clumsy writing, immature moralizing and some of the silliest detective work ever perpetrated. There are some obligatory pieties about child abuse and a trendy, bare-chested finale a la Rambo in this first novel. (October 16)