An honest lawyer, a Czech hand model, and a box of mysterious Christmas ornaments--each plays a part in Colin Harrison's compelling new intrigue


George Young never thought of himself as a detective, but that's pretty much his vocation--an attorney at a top insurance firm, it's his job to pin down suspicious claims. But Mrs. Corbett, the rich, eccentric wife of the firm's founder, has it in mind to put George's skills to a peculiar assignment. With only a few months left to live, her one desire is to know the true circumstance of her son Roger's violent death. George's investigation leads him to Roger's mistress, a cagey Czech hand model named Eliska, who can cast a seductive spell simply by removing her gloves.

Did Eliska's motives for latching on to Roger get him killed? Or did some of her shadowy and dangerous little friends take care of the job? And why were there boxes and boxes of Christmas ornaments in the dead man's apartment? George will have to take a few chances of his own if he wants to get to the bottom of Roger's death for Mrs. Corbett.

Set against a volatile and vividly drawn Manhattan, Risk is prime Colin Harrison.

I was intrigued by how George handled the boxes exchange, 'tho the threats and implied violence of the Russian thugs was unsettling. I did think it very sad that George's father never revealed the relationship, and thought it amazing that the last paragraph in the book revealed that the old lady DID know. Was so sad...here she was frail, ill, dying ... and didn't do anything about 'it' (the relationship with George) sooner-after all, George was 'family'.
(?hmmm...when did she find out? )

Good descriptions really helped flesh out the story. I've spent a little time in NY and could almost 'picture' the locales.