Top Banana (Harpur & Iles Mysteries, 13) - Softcover

This is England's mystery treasure Bill James describing a 13-year-old girl known as Noon, soon to be shot dead while working as a drug courier near a rundown park. Her death sets off a series of explosions in James's latest book in his wonderfully dark and exquisitely written Harpur & Iles series.

Detective chief superintendent Colin Harpur (said to resemble a taller English version of the late boxer Rocky Marciano) plays a largely reactive role this time, trying to keep his immediate superior, assistant chief constable Desmond Iles, from doing serious mental damage to chief constable Mark Lane in their unnamed city to the north of London. "Lane's life was mortally chafed by the ACC's brilliant rough mind and unstoppable tongue," James writes. Iles wants the police to make an unholy alliance with top drug dealers, especially Mansel Shale, whose oddly brilliant dialogue suggests a mating of Damon Runyon and Harold Pinter. Lane is strongly opposed, favoring instead a dangerous attempt to infiltrate Shale's operation. "The risks were gross. Normally, the Chief would have been the first to see it, but terrible anxieties and swelling guilt had begun to fracture his judgement, and even his humanity."

Roses, Roses, the previous Harpur & Iles book, covered the murder of Harpur's wife and was on several 1998 Top 10 lists. Other fine examples of James's high art include Club, Gospel, Halo Parade, and The Lolita Man. Plunge in anywhere, and be prepared to become addicted. --Dick Adler