THE THIRD DEADLY SIN

This third outing for retired NYPD Chief of Detectives Edward X. Delaney has Sanders' customary low-level, sensationalistic readability—so it will sell. But even by pulp-thriller standards there's an insulting carelessness this time around: a novel, all about a psychopathic killer, which doesn't bother to make the killer's psycho-motives even half-believable. She is neat, mousy, frigid, pill-popping, 35-ish Zoe Kohler, a hotel secretary who once a month (yes folks, "a psychopathic female whose crimes are triggered by her monthly periods") puts on a sexy disguise, picks up an out-of-town businessman, waits till he's naked, and then goes at him (throat and groin) with a sharpened boy-scout knife. Why? Well, there are some vague references to prudish, overbearing parents and a piggish ex-husband—but nothing even close to psychopath-worthy; nor is the surface characterization convincing or consistent. So readers will have to be content with the predictable, much-padded chills here—as chapters alternate between Zoe (her murders, her sexless romance with a kindred mousy soul, her deteriorating health due to craziness and Addison's disease) and Delaney's deductions. Lots of foolish, talky to-do is made of Delaney's difficulty in getting his old colleagues (and wife Monica) to consider the possibility of a woman mass-murderer. . . complete with the notion that female psycho-crime is a natural byproduct of women's lib. The more down-to-earth police procedure is somewhat better—especially the medical detection that comes up once the cops get hold of Zoe's blood (she's wounded by one of her victims). And there's some tension, finally, when the cops close in on the crumbling Zoe, who's being pushed into marriage by her totally (implausibly) unsuspecting swain. Violent and vulgar enough for Deadly Sin fans, to be sure, with a few engaging moments in Sanders' lighter, sentimental vein; but Uhnak's slightly similar False Witness (below)—in which a psycho-killer is merely the trigger for the real drama—shows this up all too clearly for the exploitative, formula-ridden, second-rate hash it is.