From Publishers Weekly
Despite its somewhat ludicrous premise?a husband-and-wife team of assistant U.S. attorneys (she's his boss) who lie to each other, withhold vital information and then wonder why their marriage is in trouble?Wood's (Broken Trust) new thriller offers a great deal of action and a worthy villain. Arms dealer and former CIA agent Ed Nelson is a credible and deadly combination of softness and guile. He's more than a match for Alison Andrews, the ambitious first assistant U.S. attorney general, and her tougher, more pragmatic husband, Brock, who work out of Sacramento, live in a restored mansion where nude swimming keeps their sex life active and generally share everything but the important stuff. "Perhaps," Alison wonders, "they no longer shared the same dreams." In fact, Alison has been arm-twisted into letting Nelson walk after Brock and his team risked their lives to nail him. Justifiably miffed, Brock keeps secrets from Alison about his ongoing investigation into one of Nelson's associates?another believably weak but dangerous con named Denny Lara. In fluid prose, former deputy district attorney Wood is at his best showing how government operatives often trip over their own guns. He's on much shakier ground trying to make us care if the Andrews marriage can or should be saved.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
A senior federal investigator battles the even more senior federal investigator blocking his attempt to bring a big-time villain to justice. The switch: these investigators are wedded. Not that there's much left for them in the bliss department. It's a marriage under severe pressure from dueling egos and irreconcilable ambitions. Brock Andrews, head of a task force on organized crime, wants desperately to nail Ed Nelson, once a CIA super spook but now a sleazy, tacky, fast-buck operator who'll sell anything to anybodyarms, drugs, secrets, whatever a well-heeled buyer's heart desires. And if the prospective buyer happens to be a rogue government or right-wing US terrorist organization, so be it. Nelson's problems are never ethical, only tacticalwhere to get the wanted stuff, how to kill whoever stands in his way. First Assistant US Attorney in California Alison AndrewsBrock's wife and bossstarts out wanting Nelson's hide as much as her husband does. But that changes when a certain highly placed Washington powerbroker convinces her that there's a better plan. Turn the bad guy. Use the evidence Brock has compiled to make an informer out of Nelson. Go after the sharks, he says. There's corruption on the loose even more dangerous than what Ed Nelson represents. Alison is drawn to the idea; Brock hates it. ``Nelson's somebody you just stop. Period,'' he insists. So the gulf between them remains intact, actually growing wider as the tide of events washes away good will and mutual understanding. But then, finally, shockingly, the gulf closesafter a violent climax neither of the two foresaw or wished. A good story, twistier than it has to be, but held together by a sturdy spine: the intriguing war between the Andrewses, who love passionately even when they no longer dare to trust. --
Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
