Blue Justice

Onyx Books, 1998. Near Fine. There's a hard edge of diligent research to this first thriller about appar ent police suicides by former broadcast journalist Jeannine Kadow, as well as a refreshing avoidance of the cop clichés so common to the subgenre. Gri zzled veteran Ed Gavin and his new partner, sleek Ivy League rookie Jon Str ega, have enough interesting quirks to mark them as real people as they wor k to link the apparent suicides of a sudden rush of colleagues to one very determined woman who also happens to wear NYPD blue. This character, Maria Alvarez, is another original--full of believable pain and venom, using sex as one more weapon in her avenging arsenal. If you tend to think of books t hat appear as mass-market paperback originals as a lesser form of art, this one might just change your mind.