From Publishers Weekly
Houston homicide detective Stuart Haydon receives photographs that he has never seen before: two portraits of his late father, two of a woman painting at an easel and standing on a Mexico City street, and one of Haydon himself, with a bullet entering his head drawn on the photo. His search to solve the riddle of these pictures leads to a Mexican professor of anthropology whose interest in pre-Columbian civilization has crossed from the scholarly into the psychotic. Following the intended killer's trail, Haydon travels to Mexico City, where he learns that his patrician father carried on a long affair with the mother of the killer, a fiery, beautiful Mexican artist, in whose studio an explosive denouement takes place. Unfortunately, Lindsey's narrative drags and fails to satisfy. The prose is woodenly repetitive ("Haydon had no answers, only questions, unsettling questions that he was compelled to pursue with a complex sensitivity that combined feelings of urgency and trepidation"). In addition, the characters are cliched: Haydon's father's lover, for example, has "majestic breasts and blazing green eyes." Most crucial, the many allusions to Aztec rites and beliefs don't have a strong connection with the central events of the book. Major ad/promo.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
This truly remarkable and hauntingly atmospheric thriller may well overshadow Jonathan Kellerman's The Butcher's Theater ( LJ 3/1/88) in emotional intensity and suspense. Stuart Haydon, a well-known Houston homicide detective, receives a series of provocative photographs that invalidate the known background of his deceased father. This distrubing puzzle lures Haydon to Mexico City. Lush descriptions, historical insights, and moody, psychological twists accentuate Haydon's insistent excursions into his father's past. Memorable characters, stunning settings, and masterful composition. REK
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.
