CONSIDER THE CROWS

Former San Francisco cop Susan Wren, now a widow and the police chief in tiny, insular Hampstead, Kansas, discovers that Lynnelle—the poor waif found dead in the woods—thought local college math professor Carena Egersund was the birth-mother who relinquished her years before. Did Carena kill her to keep her silent? Carena is clearly worried about something—perhaps her sister Caitlin's latest descent into schizzy hallucinations. Or her recent brouhaha with college vice-chancellor Audrey Kalazar, whose daughter was using Lynnelle's place to meet her boyfriend. Then Audrey disappears; her secretary stews—and tells a lie or two—and her writer-husband admits to an affair. Are the two deaths connected? Susan and Officer Parkhurst sort through a passel of red herrings and emerge with...the least likely suspect. Plot heavy, like The Winter Widow (1992), but salvaged by interesting characters. Weir hasn't quite got the hang of a bang-up ending, and she's surely not one to turn to for a delicious turn- of-phrase. Overall: fairly standard stuff.