"BLOOD RED, SNOW WHITE"

by Diane & Nicholas Horrock Henry ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 21, 1992

A husband-and-wife pair's first novel in which up-and-coming, moderately honest Manhattan lawyer Alec Anton interrupts his defense of two clients--caught with their hands in the till--to search reluctantly for an alluring neighbor's drug-involved son. Alec's protests that he doesn't do missing persons--he just wants to be left alone to plea-bargain white-collar looters Felix Schwartzberg and Jimmy Gallagher out of prison time--don't stand a chance weighed against his divorced neighbor Lee Hastings's fabulous body, suitably and frequently deployed. But Lee's missing son Noah, barely out of his teens, is big trouble, as even slow-witted Alec gradually realizes: Noah was not only the school chum of Philip Ochoa, scion of the fabulously wealthy Colombian flower-importing family, but also the advance man for the Ochoas' multimillion-dollar American cocaine trade. And when Noah is linked to corporate blue-blood Trumbull Oakes, a pivotal figure in Felix and Jimmy's scare, the chase for the missing boy seems to be heating up. But just then, halfway through, Noah turns up dead--and the story trails off into a deeper mess than Lee's landed Alec in, as his obsessive quest for Noah turns into a series of frantic maneuvers against the bad guys, the police, and his own partners, determined to shut him out--with Lee putting in periodic appearances to remind you why Alec got involved in the first place. In due course: Alec gets seduced by a cocaine-snorting associate in his firm who lodges an affidavit against him; Felix gets blown away; Alec's US attorney buddy Vinny Santorini suppresses Alec's evidence against Oakes and puts the DEA on Alec's tail; Alec sends a copy of the evidence to Ochoa Senior; Oakes gets blown away; and Noah's killer comes after Alee and Lee in a ludicrous finale. Any questions? A feverish fantasia on themes from tormented-attorney fiction and newspaper stories on drugs and financial malfeasance.

Pub Date: Feb. 21, 1992

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 336

Publisher: "Little, Brown"

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 1991

Categories: FICTION