Dark Side: More Ta

Almost a throwback to the 1960s, Babel is a small community in rural Virginia whose members are sure they can be not only self-supporting but also show the world how to be similarly upstanding. But when one of Babel's leading citizens dies of carbon monoxide poisoning, apparently the victim of a misfunctioning gas detector, his widow sues for millions. The alarm's manufacturer hires private eye Loren Swift to investigate. What narrator Swift finds is a tangle of motives and ambiguities that eventually points to murder. Swift is paired with tough, brainy detective Sally Hatch and they're soon enmeshed in Babel's convoluted couplings. They're also in peril, resolved rather violently, but deliberately not neatly. Hornig (Foul Shot, Hardball comes up with a nice plot, fascinating characters (notably an unlikely but believable sheriff) and some lovely Virginia countryside. As icing on the cake, Hornig even manages to write unsensationally about bisexuality. (October 16)