PRIVILEGED LIVES

Money, sex, clothes, greed, revenge, drugs, and murder--all in one glossy package from the author of For Richer, For Poorer; Ariana, and Ballerina. The body of a beautiful yng man, wearing a leather mask and missing one leg, is found in an empty luxury high-rise apartment--and handsome, widowed Detective Vince Cardozo tracks the murderer down through the Soho art world and sleazy homosexual clubs, harassed at every turn by a famous shoddy lawyer who turns out to be dying of AIDS. Meanwhile, beautiful socialite Babe Vanderwalk Devons wakes from a coma induced seven years earlier by a shot of insulin apparently given by her husband (everybody in this book sounds strangely familiar). Now poor Babe has plenty of troubles: she can't understand why her husband would have wanted to kill her; her daughter is estranged; her parents overprotect her; and all her friends are having problems with booze and coke. Eventually, the story lines come together, as do Vince and Babe; and it's all good, undeniably readable junk if one can ignore the wild inaccuracies, sloppy writing, and loose ends. Unfortunately, though, the last third of the book degenerates into kinky homosexual sex, bondage, child pornography, and torture, and what was splendid, silly fun with a couple of good puzzles becomes merely sensational. Glamorous, glitzy fare for the strong of stomach.