Night Vision: A Jake Lassiter Novel

In contrast to his taut, punchy first novel, To Speak for the Dead , Levine's second is characterized by excess--an outlandish plot, too many characters and too many soggy wisecracks. But the blistering running commentary of hero-lawyer Jake Lassiter on drug dealers, developers and life in murder-a-day Dade County, Fla., plus a horrific denouement, easily makes up for the tale's shortcoming. With his Latin-spouting, bonefishing sidekick, retired coroner Charlie Riggs, the former Miami Dolphins linebacker tracks a serial killer and runs up against political corruption. The killer's first three victims are women who belong to Compu-Mate, an electronic network whose members talk dirty to one another. Jake, dragooned into becoming a special prosecutor, turns for guidance to Pamela Metcalf, an icy British psychiatrist in Miami on a book tour. As the body count mounts, suspicions fall on ambitious state attorney Nick Wolf, with a shadowy past in Vietnam; detective Alejandro Rodriquez; drunken drama professor and failed actor Gerald Prince; and the owners of Compu-Mate, ex-jockey Max Blinderman and his gorgeous spouse, Bobbie. 50,000 first printing; $50,000 ad/promo. (Sept.)