The Fall of St. Sebastian

Almost a decade after introducing Peter Farrell (in 2004's The Cross of St. Maro), Keady continues his adventures in a fast-moving suspense yarn that reads like a good season of the TV show 24. Farrell is no longer deputy chief of staff to the President, but when duty calls, he's unable to say no. Accidental chief executive Madeline Scholfield, elevated to the most powerful job on the planet after the both the president and the VP died, needs Farrell to help assess a biblical code from the Book of Enoch that purportedly predicts imminent disaster, and seems to refer to Farrell by name. The threat of a new avian flu, possibly a Chinese bioweapon that could kill millions of Americans adds to the tension, as do the machinations of those seeking to depose Scholfield. Keady does not just kill off redshirts, adding a more serious tone, and insuring that the reader regards the high stakes as real, and he is as adept at juggling plot lines as better-known genre writers. (Mar.)