THEIR EVIL WAYS

Another ho-hum journey into Wainwright's world of dank police-procedure and sleazy crookedness--this time the northern-England city of Lessford, where the North End police spend their hours trying to keep one step ahead of the incredibly tacky populace. Dour, cryptic Detective Chief Superintendent Flensing is on loan to head an investigation into the death of Sammy Gatling, small-time crook and local Don Juan. And, though Sammy's death in a card-game with three other lowlifes was in fact accidental, the coppers--in the course of trying to find evidence of murder--turn over a lot of slimy rocks. . . with some of the dirt eventually producing a real homicide. Pointless plotting, pathetical criminals, standard good-guy/ bad-guy police--all delivered in Wainwright's preachiest, least effective prose: one of the weakest recent products from an assembly-line manufacturer (three in 1982 alone) who's only fair at best.