cover image St. John and the Seven Veils: A Detective Novel

St. John and the Seven Veils: A Detective Novel

William Babula. Carol Publishing Corporation, $15.95 (208pp) ISBN 978-1-55972-071-7

Unlike that other San Francisco private eye, Sam Spade, Jeremiah St. John is prosperous, operating from a high-tech office in an elegant Victorian house. His partners are gorgeous Mickey, fired from a police force in Ohio after appearing nude in a Playboy ``Women in Blue'' spread, and Chief Moses, a Seminole Indian. Babula ( According to St. John ) presents a loving, realistic portrait of San Francisco, but this latest caper is simply outre. A Vietnam soldier, missing and presumed dead for 16 years, returns without publicity and becomes the ``April Fool'' serial killer. Meanwhile a group of returned MIAs is assembled by a mysterious general, who uses them to extort money from Vietnamese refugees in order to finance a mad, Rambo-like scheme. The novel tastelessly perpetuates the myth of the maniacal Vietnam vet. (June)