Rivers of Gold

Dunn's debut, a near-future crime novel, offers a scary view of a fiscally devastated New York City, but the execution falls short of the concept. NYPD Det. Sixto Santiago works for the controversial Citywide Anticrime Bureau, an outfit launched to combat an uptick in crime whose actions in response to a police fatality have led to citywide riots. Assigned to undercover work, Sixto ends up on a murder case, which he views as a chance for advancement, after the mutilated corpse of Eyad Fouad, an Egyptian immigrant and cabdriver, surfaces near the Manhattan entrance of the Holland Tunnel. Predictably, the trail takes a few twists and turns before the reader learns that Fouad's death was not a simple murder. Less than memorable characters and a dive into unsubtle farce toward the end (city officials have names like Janice Anopheles, Isabella Trichinella, and Tsetse Fly) don't help. (Oct.)