The Bird Yard

Grim and intense, this novel gives readers an instant jolt with its stark depiction of evil lurking in the decaying back alleys and crumbling infrastructure of Manchester, England. When 12-year-old Gary disappears from his home, Detective Superintendent Parker quickly recognizes that his disappearance is eerily similar to one that occurred five years earlier, in 1992, when another 12-year-old boy, Joseph, vanished. As Parker and his team try to locate Gary, they are deeply disturbed to discover Joseph's skeleton in a remote woods. The pathology report suggests he was murdered in a ritualistic manner. Parker, with the aid of criminal psychologist Murray Hanson, intensifies the hunt for Gary and soon discovers that the two boys, who were both neglected by their parents, had worked for a pet-shop owner who has ties to two other suspects: a reclusive breeder of exotic finches and a convicted pedophile. The streetwise Parker aims to strengthen the fragile links between the three men before a third victim disappears. Parker is a winning protagonist, shrewd and compassionate, but Hanson's character is not as convincingly developed, for he is nearly smothered in a distracting subplot. Even so, Martin, whose last book, A Likeness in Stone, was nominated for an Edgar Award, has worked a keen note of malevolence into her novel and created a gripping story that has firm psychological underpinnings. (Sept.)