DEEP IN THE CUT

A bored but bright lawyer gets caught up in murder in Worlde’s thriller.

Immigration attorney Siskal “Siskie” Bonifante is divorced and lonely in the nation’s capital, bored by representing hard-luck Latinos who are just this side of deportation. He’ll also be the first to tell you he’s fat. Bonifante has a new clientele—young Russian women who entered the country as nannies—and a recently deceased friend: an aging immigration judge who was murdered just before they were due to meet. It seems the dead judge was involved in a porn film ring, and Bonifante is compelled to find out who killed him, especially after he meets the judge’s sexy widow. Then, one of the nannies and several other clients turn up missing or dead. Can Bonifante wrap his head around the mystery before he’s arrested, murdered by the shadowy Black Priest or finished with his next bottle of Corona? As expected, the author—a retired immigration court judge who began his career representing asylum applicants at the Central American Refugee Center in Washington, DC—has an impressive grasp of immigration law. Also impressive are his colorful portraits of la Raza, the Central American immigrants who populate this tale, including Bonifante’s ex–brother-in-law (a Latino FBI agent) and the hookers, housekeepers and clients who deal with the lawyer every day. Readers will be drawn to Siskie despite his mistakes and confusion and the tedious turn-by-turn driving directions and parking information given seemingly every time he gets behind the wheel of his Beamer. The many food and drink references match him well—that’s just who Bonifante is—but Worlde’s occasional wooden delivery of back story in exposition and dialogue can slow things down at times. It’s a shame, too, that some errors creep in—like the misspelling of quinceañera—but they don’t ruin the party.

Bonifante’s goofy charm, keen self-perception and wily ambition make for quite the escapade.