AS GOOD AS DEAD

When Lucy Flood learns, at age 41, that her melanoma is incurable, she doesn’t ask for a second opinion. Nor does she tell her faithless husband Warren, who’s too absorbed in his affair with neighbor Yolande Kramer to offer much support. She doesn’t opt for any of the treatments Dr. Lodge presses on her that could extend and improve her remaining time on earth. Instead, she goes straight to Lorenzo, the killer-for-hire she writes letters for as a volunteer at the state prison. And Lorenzo puts her in touch with Philip Crowe, a hit man who’s a little more skilled, a little more careful, and maybe a little luckier than Lorenzo, so he’s available for the job Lucy offers—a job that requires a stone killer, silent and methodical. So far, so good. If Crowe is such a lone wolf, though, why has he hooked up with Larry, a young punk so stupid that even after Crowe cold-cocks him and leaves him for dead in the airport parking lot, he bounds back and asks Crowe to take him on as an apprentice? Maybe it’s because of Larry’s waiflike girlfriend Madeline, who offers Crowe something he can’t really trust. But adding partners just increases opportunities for double-crosses in this tale of ever-shifting alliances and ever-changing hearts.

Unfortunately, clerical insider McInerny (Emerald Aisle, 2001, etc.), the creator of Father Dowling, can’t resist putting an allegorical spin on an otherwise fine thriller with a new twist ’round every dark corner.