cover image Passing Judgment

Passing Judgment

Keith Ferrell. Forge, $24.95 (0pp) ISBN 978-0-312-86173-5

The former longtime editor-in-chief of Omni magazine makes a strong fiction debut--not with science fiction, however, but with a morally charged crime novel set in rural North Carolina. Narrator Baird Lowen lives a hermit's life, four years after retiring due to a violent incident, shown in flashback, at the height of his Hollywood directing career. His former high-school classmate, meanwhile, rising state legislator Roy Duncan, who married Baird's first love, Ellen, has become a powerful attorney closely allied to televangelist mogul Frederick Prescott. Using the incident that drove Baird from Hollywood as leverage, Roy coerces the former filmmaker into returning to their home town to find out who has been threatening to release graphic photos of Ellen having sex with Baird, taken when they were 16 years old. Despite the overlay of violence and death, this novel is not so much a thriller as a forceful yet balanced examination of the rise to political power of the religious right. The plotting is smooth and the characters true, particularly those who wield power with a sure and ruthless charm. Ferrell proves a natural storyteller here, with a voice all his own. (June)