Next to Last Chance

When Laura Owen is appointed Commissioner of Public Safety and head of the State Patrol as part of a political ploy by Mississippi's lame duck governor, the first woman to head a state law-enforcement body knows she has her work cut out for her. Vowing to crack down on drunk driving and drugs, she faces good ol' boy resistance in the form of U.S. Attorney Alex Markham, her longtime nemesis who sees Laura as his chief competition for the governor's job. What Laura doesn't know (but the reader does, nearly from the beginning) is that Alex killed a man while driving drunk 15 years ago and that his best friend, Tom, who just happens to be married to Laura's best friend, Ann, is a drug smuggler. Dixon shares her alter ego's career background, and the reader never doubts the authenticity of her insider perspective concerning Laura's war on drugs. Dixon's skills as a novelist are rough, however. The dialogue is painfully hackneyed, even car chase scenes drag and Dixon numbs a reader with procedural details. It doesn't help that that the reader knows the outcome from the start. With two books left in a projected trilogy, Dixon has some practicing to do. Author tour. (Sept.) FYI: Dixon was Mississippi's first female Commissioner of Public Safety, from 1988 to 1992.