The House of Blue Lights

South of Market is San Francisco's sleazy underside, populated by winos and derelicts, drug dealers and an occasional advocate for the poor and dispossessed. Cassandra Thorpe is one of these. A burned-out public defender, she is about to leave for the quiet rewards of a law practice in Santa Rosa when a charming old gent walks into her office with a briefcase full of coded, multicolored graphs and intimations that the owner of a shelter for the homeless is less philanthropic than he appears. Cass is drawn into a vortex of events involving a land-development scheme, two fires (one the possible arson of a local bar and the other the midnight torching of the bar's now-homeless owner in a park), a persistent myth about treasure buried under the demolished bar's parking lot and the city's organized crime network. Besides the redoubtable and compassionate Cass, who fixes old jukeboxes as a hobby, characters include her weak, opportunistic former husband, her mother (who runs a local diner), a spaced-out blond giant with an urge to violence and the large, ever-varied cast of San Francisco's indigent. This is a complicated and satisfying first effort; readers will look forward to seeing more of Cassandra Thorpe. (December 21)