DEAD CONNECTION, by Alafair Burke, Henry Holt, 319 pages, $19.95
Alafair Burke, the lawyer-daughter of prominent crime novelist James Lee Burke, has made the grade as a crime novelist in her own right. She is a former deputy district attorney in Portland, Ore., but she now lives in New York City where she writes and teaches criminal law at Hofstra University.
Burke has written three novels in her Samantha Kincaid series: "Judgment Calls," "Missing Justice" and "Close Case."
But her latest, "Dead Connection," introduces a new character, police detective Ellie Hatcher, on loan to homicide to act as "date bait," to catch an Internet killer. Burke writes suspenseful thrillers in a reader-friendly, witty style.
The set-up here begins with the murder of two young women on the streets of New York, exactly one year apart. The killer has left a clue that calls to mind FirstDate, a popular online dating service, and Flann McIlroy, an eccentric homicide detective enlists Ellie to help him solve the crimes, as she fits the profile of the other victims.
The irony in this book is that Burke actually met her husband through a dating site three years ago. She wasn't intending to find a book in her experiment, but she thought a great deal about why so many people choose to trust a stranger.
The character of Ellie grew up in Wichita, Kan., the daughter of a cop who had tracked a serial killer. Burke herself grew up in Wichita when the BTK killer was roaming the area in the 1970s.
The author explores the problems of a young woman conversing with a stranger on the Internet and not knowing how much to believe about his biography or his statement of interests. Ellie logs onto FirstDate herself and immediately makes a connection with a man she finds interesting. She accepts his invitation to meet at a restaurant, then they click.
Only one problem — she lies to him the whole evening and he appears to be telling the truth. His name is Peter Morse and he is a criminal-investigation writer for a newspaper. She starts to feel guilty that he does not know she is a cop or that she is visiting the online site as part of a crime investigation. She vaguely insists they can never see each other again.
But further online activity produces some dangerous-sounding men — one designated as Enoch, trying for biblical ties. When a third murder is committed there is a clue to link the killer with the most recent murder, only a week earlier. Ellie gains access to "The Book of Enoch," translated a century ago, and reads it for clues.
Ellie is an intellectual detective. She decides the guy named Enoch is "the fallen angel lusting for these women on FirstDate." In the meantime, Peter is writing about the murders and imagining himself as another Jimmy Breslin, seeking out the Son of Sam killer.
Soon he sees a computer photo of Ellie and realizes she is the same woman he has been thinking about ever since their intriguing first date. Ellie has been identified with her father and his past. Not long after, Peter and Ellie meet again in the police precinct where Peter offers her evidence in the killings that he has been writing about.
This is a good story, marked by strong dialogue and witty repartee. It's clear that Burke is nobly following in her father's footsteps.
E-mail: dennis@desnews.com