THE RIVERVIEW MURDERS

Ordinarily you'd ask the police to help find your missing brother, but when he's been missing for 30 years, the police aren't interested. So Margaret O'Mara, piqued by an obituary for Michael Minogue, her brother Joseph Colleran's former partner, hires specialist Paul Whelan to find Colleran. Whelan, left even more depressed than usual by the absence of his girlfriend Sandra McAuliffe, makes the rounds of the old gang Colleran shared with Minogue, and predictably finds that even the ones who weren't killed in WW II have been dropping like flies—especially once news of Whelan's involvement gets out. Interesting people and authentically seedy atmosphere make up for the low-grade puzzle. But when is Whelan (Killer on Argyle Street, 1995, etc.) ever going to get out of his gang-of-guilty- secrets rut?