Human Solutions

Silberstein’s uneven debut opens with an original setup. In 1988 Santiago, Chile, a shadowy narrator known only as Javier runs a creepy business known as Human Solutions, which guarantees to make its clients’ desires come true via the manipulation of others. A female client, for example, wants a hunky meteorologist to fall in love with her. Instead of offering ever-harder requests, Silberstein shifts the plot in a more conventional direction. Elena, a woman the reclusive Javier has become enamored of, has learned that her 12-year-old son, Claudio, may be the victim of sexual abuse at his cultlike boarding school. Javier volunteers to help Elena, securing an ally in Tibor, a former client of his who sought revenge on a sadistic Nazi doctor. Javier concocts a not particularly clever plan to free Claudio, and few readers will feel the novel’s payoff was worth their time. (Apr.)