Don't Talk to Strangers

Campbell (See How They Run) succeeds only partially in the difficult task she sets herself in this romantic suspense: bringing to life a fantasy world on the Internet while building suspense and terror in the characters' real lives. Carrie Blue, a former policewoman, is hired by private detective Hayden Ivanovich to help investigate the disappearance of several young women who had become romantically involved via their computers. Ultimately, Carrie, Hayden and others find themselves in real physical danger, but to land them there requires several implausible developments. These include a terrorist plot and a woman so gullible she gives up everything for her cyberlover even though she knows a murderer is stalking the Internet. Despite these flaws, Campbell offers powerful writing, well-drawn main characters and haunting images of an alternate reality that seems custom-made for predators, sexual manipulators and liars. (Dec.)