The Lovers

Connolly's latest thriller sees a depressed, soul-searching Charlie Parker stripped of his private investigator's license, tending bar in Maine and still tormented by the dark secrets in his past: the murder of his wife and daughter and the mysterious suicide of his policeman father, Will. He returns to New York to investigate the circumstances of his father's death and is contacted by a woman who claims to be haunted by an unseen and deadly presence. Jay Sanders does full justice to Connolly's taut narrative, relying on an approach that is colorful yet restrained, edgy yet traditional in a perfect interpretation of this novel that combines elements of classic noir with the supernatural. An Atria hardcover (Reviews, May 4). (June)