The Bridge

At the outset of Prebble’s tense thriller, a man suddenly starts throwing children from London’s Waterloo Bridge into the water below. In minutes, six people are dead and the man has disappeared into the crowd. No one can provide a description other than that he wore jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, like many other young men. CCTV cameras have little to offer. Near the scene is Michael Beaumont, an aspiring TV sound mixer. Michael is eager to introduce Alison Parsons, his new girlfriend, to his grandmother Rose, who lives in a nursing home in Battersea. When Rose first sees Alison, she starts to scream. Why? And why is Alison so evasive about her childhood? Finding the answers becomes critical when the police receive a message from the killer, who has since gone on to take other lives, leading them to evidence that ties Michael to the crimes. Unfortunately, Prebble relies on too many farfetched coincidences. Readers will hope that he avoids such tricks next time and returns to the form he showed in his first novel, The Insect Farm. [em]Agent: Deborah Schneider, Gelfman Schneider/ICM. (Mar.) [/em]