Shooting Star

Australian ex-cop Frank Calder, now a self-described mediator, has his hands full in this hard-hitting standalone from Ned Kelly Award%E2%80%93winner Temple (Truth). At the invitation of Pat Carson, "patriarch of the Carson dynasty," Calder visits the family compound outside Melbourne, where he meets Pat and his two sons, Barry and Tom. Tom's 15-year-old granddaughter, Anne, has been kidnapped, and the family wants Calder to deliver the $1 million ransom. Despite reservations, Calder agrees, and is sucked into a situation dealing with not only the demands of the kidnappers but the dysfunctional Carsons, whose history includes the earlier kidnapping of Barry's then-11-year-old granddaughter, Alice. Calder has to wonder "what sort of curse lay on this family... that their children were stolen from them, that those they touched they marked with crosses of ash." Calder handles the rough and tumble, as well as the pampered and the spoiled, in this gritty, well-executed tale of greed and vengeance. (Feb.)