Texas noir anyone? In Fate's violent second novel featuring Kristin Van Dijk (after 2006's Baby Shark
), the newly licensed PI and her obstreperous partner, Otis Millett, investigate the disappearance of a Texas oil heiress. No sooner do they settle down to business than nasty gangsters get aggressive and the bodies begin piling up with tedious rapidity. Combine countless baddies being blown away, young women beaten up, a routine mystery plot and questionable sociological implications (cops can't be trusted), and the agglutination of seedy detail winds up being depressing rather than unsettling. The carnage may titillate some, but other readers may detect the warmed-over smell of Rambo
and The Terminator
. (May)
