LEOPARD IN THE SUN

Leopard In The Sun ($23.00; Sept. 1; 256 pp.; 0-609-60386-8): A yeasty melodrama, first published in 1993, about the violent underpinnings of her country’s thriving drug trade, by the Colombian author of The Angel of Galilea (1998). It’s an amusingly over-the-top tale about the “chain of blood” that links together several generations of the rival Barrag†n and Monsalve families: a bitter ongoing feud that spawns epic sexual rivalries and brutal assassinations, and features such boldly drawn characters as businesslike crime boss Mani Monsalve, emotionless “young prince of horror” Raca Barrag†n, and the imperturbably erotic “La Muda,” a mature beauty whose virtue is reputedly protected by “a chastity belt with thirty-six sharp teeth in front and fifteen in back” Subtle it isn’t, but Restrepo keeps the pot boiling energetically—producing an improbably entertaining, guilty-pleasure Colombian Godfather.