STILL LIFE WITH CROWS

FBI Special Agent Pendergast is one of the most intriguing detective characters in the genre. He is a transcendental supersleuth with exotic tastes and impeccable manners. Capable of self-hypnotic trances, he recreates a scene and deduces what might have happened. This pale-eyed, pale-haired, black-suited genius is a specialist in everything, especially serial murder. Medicine Creek, Kansas, needs his talents. When Sheriff Hazen discovers the mutilated body of a young relic hunter, Pendergast appears--even before the media. Corrie, a teenaged Goth with purple hair, becomes Pendergast's assistant, and the gore continues to drip. Narrator Scott Brick shines, slipping easily in and out of Pendergast's honeyed Southern drawl. He makes Hazen's Kansas twang vibrate. Brick brings each ghastly tableau to life, complete with subterranean mazes, scary monsters, and buckets of blood. S.J.H. (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC 03/JAN 04]