Thinning the Predators

FBI agent Ira Levitt finds himself in a chilling alliance with cold-blooded murderer David Vandemark, a deadly serial killer who preys on the dregs of society--drug dealers, child molesters, other serial killers--to find the Latino Killer, a vicious psychopath stalking New York's Hispanic families.

A telepathic serial killer whose victims are serial killers and the FBI agent who has been tracking him for seven years mix it up in this energetic but derivative thriller, the authors' third collaboration (after Among Madmen and Lady L). David Vandemark was a lawyer until an elevator accident left him comatose long enough for his wife and kids to be slain by a serial killer known as Mr. Clean. The accident also left Vandemark able to read minds?a trait he put to use as a vigilante to hunt down Mr. Clean, who was the first of his 20 victims, and which has remained hidden from Ira Levitt, the fed who lives to take Vandemark down. Now Vandemark has a new target, the killer behind the so-called Latino Family murders in New York. But once he arrives in Manhattan, Vandemark comes up against a powerful conspiracy and meets a beautiful woman who helps him to remember the man he once was?with both events prompting him to go for help to agent Levitt. Brisk pacing and some slickly wrought violence will keep readers turning the pages. The narrative's reliance on pop psychology (love as the cure for obsessive split personality, for instance) takes the edge off the chills, however, and the authors' twist ending won't surprise too many readers; ultimately, despite its nifty premise, this is an exercise in formula. Film rights optioned by Amblin Entertainment; foreign rights sold to 10 countries.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Garziunas and Starlin (Lady El, Dutton, 1992) begin their latest in the shadow of Silence of the Lambs. A young FBI agent, Vida Johnson, is assigned to help another agent whose last seven years have been a fruitless hunt for a vigilante killer. The story forks here as the reader learns that the vigilante, David Vandemark, has been using telepathic powers to track and kill serial murderers who were eluding justice, beginning with the one who murdered his wife and child. The story follows Vandemark as he goes to New York City to hunt the "Latino Family Killer"; he and his FBI pursuers discover that this last serial killer is part of a secret government project. The story's start is taut and mysterious, the finish with the CIA a bit cliched, and there is plenty of violence. It expertly keeps the reader in suspense. Although Thinning the Predators falls short of the Thomas Harris classic, public libraries will still want to stock a few copies as the story is well told. With the film rights already sold to Spielberg, this book is virtually guaranteed a trip to the big screen.
-?Robert Moore, Dupont Merck Info. Svcs., North Billerica, Mass.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

This blood-soaked, explosion-wracked story, a cog in the hype machine for a Spielberg movie-to-be, indicates that movie producers like ideas that have already proven successful. In this case, the authors' protagonist is lifted--either intentionally or unconsciously--straight from Stephen King's Dead Zone. You remember, a guy goes into a coma after a horrible accident, emerges with a telepathic gift, and proceeds to use it to expose and defeat a nefarious government conspiracy. King's man averted a nuclear war; Graziunas and Starlin's put away a rogue intelligence operation. After his trauma, the authors' man, Vandemark, embarks on a solo vigilante mission to extirpate serial killers. After rubbing out a score of them, he targets a vicious psychopath who murders Latino families. All along, an odd-couple FBI team have been tailing him, but instead of arresting the clairvoyant Vandemark, they become his allies and trace the Latino killer's trail to a seedy warehouse, the set for a finale of high-explosive, fiery mayhem. A cartoonish tale that will depend on the movie to generate readers. Gilbert Taylor