The Hot Place

When Barney Brodsky, the thoroughly disliked chairman of a country club on Long Island, N.Y., is suffocated in the steam room, no one particularly regrets his passing except those suspected of his murder. Venture capitalist Ed Baer and his philosopher son Warren ( The Dead Room ) are especially involved, because it is Warren who has found the body. First on the list of suspects is Bill Carey, the spa manager and a client of the Baers, who are underwriting a gym he is planning to establish. Brodsky had tried to get Carey fired when he learned that Carey, a Catholic, wanted to marry his granddaughter, a union that he opposed on religious grounds. Five other prominent club members were nearby when the murder took place--all of them with ties to Brodsky, who had a nasty habit of needling people about their failings or misdeeds. Against the background of Ed's efforts to get Warren married off so he finally will have some grandchildren, the father and son team, with the reluctant permission of Sgt. Ben Palmieri, seek the killer. Resnicow turns out a lively tale, creating in the irascible Ed Baer a delightful character who artfully shows us some Jewish cultural byways. (Jan.)