Beauty Sleep

Medicine and high-tech cosmetology, combined here by an author who clearly knows a good deal about both, give overtones of Faust and Frankenstein to this spinechilling thriller. Amy Martin is a columnist for Femina magazine, Dr. David Copeland an endocrinologist not above bending the rules to keep his hospital afloat. Together they unearth a conspiracy in which beautiful models serve as involuntary guinea pigs in the production of a hormone-based beauty cream that, offering new skin, bones and flesh, gives new meaning to the word ``makeover.'' Klein's ( Embryo ; Wavelengths ) background details have a convincing and even alarming rattle as his story raises intriguing questions about the price of beauty. (July)