Prayers for the Dead

Dr Azor Sparks is a genius. A famous surgeon set to transform the chances for heart transplant patients. He''s also a pillar of the local church and a devoted family man. So who would want to murder him? The answer, Lt. Peter Decker concludes, is many people. Sparks was obsessed by religion and his medical crusades.Yet he had odd hobbies, like riding with a pack of bikers. His family, too, is not harmonious. The influence of Bram, the son who defied his Protestant father to become a Catholic priest, appears to be all that''s preventing them from destroying each other. And, as beneficiaries of an astonishingly large trust fund, they all stand to gain from his death. But then the evidence from a second murder points, unmistakably, to Bram, whom Decker thought was highly unlikely to be involved...

Dr. Azor Moses Sparks is an extremely esteemed heart surgeon, a devout fundamentalist Christian, a cyclist, a friend of biker gangs; a friend to all. Until he is found dead in an alley with his chest ripped open, that is. Where does one go to begin in the investigation of a man who had no enemies? Lt. Peter Decker starts with the man's family, which he discovers is large and filled with strife and unstable characters. He also finds some problems in his own affairs, mostly involving religious beliefs--his own, those of his Orthodox Jewish wife and those of a Roman Catholic priest who plays a prominent role in the multilayered thriller.