Blood Mask Book

Awealthy, charismatic, and controversial "benefactress of art," Drewe Hildebrand disappears from her estate on the Hudson River, seemingly abducted in the night. Her young niece, Marta, found in a desolate wooded area close by, is too traumatized to describe the abductors. A provocative exhibit of avant-garde "bio-art" that includes a blood mask of Drewe Hildebrand is disrupted by protestors.

In this, her third suspense novel, Lauren Kelly explores the startling world of "bio-artists" and their admirers, examining the intermingling of private, inscrutable motives with public masks of dominance and power; the ways in which spiritual yearnings may be transformed into worldly, erotic appetites that consume the innocent.

Publishers Weekly

Joyce Carol Oates's gripping third suspense novel under her Kelly pseudonym (after 2005's The Stolen Heart) explores twisted love. Shy, insecure teenager Annemarie Straube becomes the object of intense scrutiny when she's discovered half-clothed and drugged, wandering through the woods. She and her aunt, Drewe Hildebrand, were apparently abducted by fundamentalist Christians who vandalized the older woman's Hudson River estate. Under police questioning, Annemarie has only fragmentary memories of the attack and of being force-fed a powder later determined to be crystal meth. Through flashbacks, Kelly portrays the odd relationship between Annemarie and Drewe and the bizarre assortment of cutting-edge artists who were part of their circle and who eventually emerge as the main suspects in the kidnapping. Since the heroine is the very definition of the proverbial unreliable narrator, piecing together subtle psychological clues to discover the truth will challenge most readers. Fans of Minette Walters and Ruth Rendell will be well pleased. (May) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.