Step aside 007, you've met your match! Micki Garrity is a gun-totin' PI with a vengeance. Actually, she totes several guns. Just when business is looking good and her life seems to be running smoothly, Micki's worthless cousin Tim suddenly shows up, and he is no longer worth less. That happens to be a problem, since Tim-more recently known to himself and to others as Zodiac-unwisely enriched himself at the expense of a couple of mobsters. These concerned parties are now in a race to see who gets to kill Zodiac and to lay hands on the loot he's cached-not necessarily in that order. Since blood is thicker than water, Garrity agrees to help him out of his uncomfortable situation. The results are standard private-eye fare, with a bit more besides. There's unrefined torture, lots of gore, and enough bodies to make me lose count. In the course of trying to help her hapless relative, Garrity-despite her armament and her martial arts training-manages repeatedly and mindlessly to stray into the clutches of unsavory characters who wreak various forms of bodily injury upon her. The one bright light is her encounter with a handsome black male who happens to also be a private investigator. Among the many difficulties with that relationship, however, is the fact she doesn't trust him.

Since I am no great fan of mayhem, A FAVOR FOR ZODIAC doesn't happen to be my cup of tea. But there is no denying that Blue has a way with words, that he can maintain an incredibly fast pace, and that many of the characters peopling these pages are fascinatingly evil. If you've been reading a lot of cozies lately and, for a change, want a shoot-em-up to rival anything on the tube, then this is the book for you.