FIXIN' TO DIE
by Jerry Oster
Inoffensive convict Elvis Polk's shooting of NYPD officer Jenny Swale in the opening paragraph here (her partner Luther Todd has to wait until the next page) sets off a dizzying plot whose leading question is: Where did handcuffed Elvis get his gun if not via a police plant in Jenny's car? It's a question that swiftly implicates both New York's finest (Joe Cullen, of Internal Affairs, focuses on his old drinking buddy Commissioner Phil Hriniak, who was the subject not only of Jenny's sexual-harassment complaint the previous year, but also of an amateurish sex photo costarring Jenny's roommate Jo Dante) and New York's loudest (why are glamorous news anchor Samantha Cox and policeman-turned-councilman Steven Poole so interested in the accidental death of 14-year-old Quintana Davidoff, a case that Joe's main squeeze, Ann Jones, has been working on)? As in veteran Oster's earlier procedurals (Violent Love, p. 288, etc.): lots of tough/silly talk, lots of guys getting hammered (girls too—Jenny Swale is only the first), lots of good dirty fun for all.