Point

Blackthorne (a pseudonym for John Meaney) follows 2010's Edge with another over-the-top near-future action-adventure romp featuring retired British special forces operative Josh Cumberland. So-called Cutter Circles have been springing up: 13 dead teens in a circle, each cutting the wrists of the next. The teens don't know one another, and news blackouts mean that they can't be copycats. Cumberland, emotionally fragile since his daughter's death, begins fitting pieces together as he tracks a scientist's disappearance. Meanwhile, his girlfriend, Suzanne, an expert in psychosemantics who can modify behavior with a word, gets called in by MI5 to consult on the case. Their separate investigations become all the more urgent when someone they know, Opal, cuts herself as part of a failed Cutter Circle that provides valuable clues. The action moves so quickly that the overwritten prose and flat characterization barely register. (Mar.)