Family Values: A Mario Balzic Novel

Few will be surprised and many will be delighted to find that Rocksburg, Pa., former police chief Mario Balzic, retired in Cranks & Shadows (1995) and returned to sleuthing in Good Sons (1996), is still in business. Constantine still delivers some of the choicest, most grittily realistic working class dialogue to be found in the genre, even though the grungy and lovable characters pontificate excessively here and the plot sags somewhat. Balzic is hired to investigate the dubious claims of a convict named Walin, who continues to protest his innocence in the murder of two drug dealers 17 years earlier. Walin's defense rests on a photo, just recently found, of him in bed with his stepmother at the time of the murders. His father is another retired small-town cop, a stroke victim who now lies mute and incontinent. Walin blames his father for much, including his arrest and incarceration. Mario finds another crooked cop in jail for murder, and discovers that all the best character witnesses are confirmed liars. An interview with Walin's toothless and battered stepmother produces a nasty tale Balzic hopes is a lie, but it is a clue that he is nevertheless bound to follow. All this family brutality brings Mario to the somber realizations that his retirement isn't such a bad thing and that his relationship with his wife could use some mending. Constantine pushes this tale to the edge of believability (the stepmother tells of unmitigated sadism), but he anchors the work with breathtakingly expressive dialogue and with Balzic's powerful decency. (Mar.)