A SINGLE STONE
by Marilyn Wallace
Oakland police duet Carlos Cruz and Jay Goldstein (A Case of Loyalties, 1985) play supporting roles this time to landscape-designer Linda Orett—who was narrowly acquitted three years ago of killing her daughter Amy, and who's now hunted (she and architect husband Matt have left town and resurfaced with new identities) as the leading suspect in a second child-murder and a kidnaping that looks like a third. The detective work, too, is less prominent than Wallace's effective handling of the scary frontier where Linda's distracted fear shades into full-blown paranoia, as she doubts her friends, increasingly obsessive Matt, and herself before Cruz and Goldstein provide the relatively sunny finale. Dead-on insight into Linda's terrified isolation, breathlessly mounting suspense, and an overwrought conclusion that will have Mary Higgins Clark fans shaking with relief.