Ask Not

In the solid 17th Nate Heller thriller, a sequel to 2012’s Target Lancer, Collins skillfully integrates fact with fiction in service of a plot centering on the suspicious-to-some numbers of witnesses to President Kennedy’s assassination who died in the months after November 22, 1963. In September 1964, a Cuban that the PI knows was involved in an attempt on J.F.K.’s life in Chicago three weeks before Dallas tries to run down Heller and his 16-year-old son on a Chicago street after a Beatles concert. With the permission of senatorial candidate Robert Kennedy, an old friend, Heller joins forces with journalist Flo Kilgore, a fictionalized version of Dorothy Kilgallen (1913–1965), to investigate an apparent conspiracy. Having played a part in facilitating the CIA-Mafia plots to knock off Castro, Heller is well-positioned to talk to those who might know why he’s been marked for death. Warren Commission skeptics will find some innovative theories of interest. Agent: Dominick Abel, Dominick Abel Literary Agency. (Oct.)