Intrigue of Sappy Thriller Is That It’s Still Compelling

David Baldacci’s “Saving Faith” (Warner,$26.95, 451 pages), bouncing around the bestseller lists here and in Europe, is, like his previous tales, unbelievable, styleless and sappy enough to make John Grisham seem positively Faulknerian. It is also inexplicably compelling. Its plot concerns a loopy CIA chieftain named Thornhill, who concocts a blackmail scheme with a top D.C. lobbyist to bring the Company back to its former glory.

When the lobbyist’s associate, Faith Lockhart, turns whistle-blower, Thornhill marks her for death. The FBI tries to guard her, but, as Baldacci would have it, her only hope for survival rests with a handsome high-tech private eye named Lee Adams.

This is obviously that musty old standby--the unfulfilled and lonely woman in jeopardy being saved from the dastardly villain by a handsome, romantic, resourceful hero. The characters are cardboard. The twists and turns are telegraphed. And the magic moment when the villain gets his comeuppance makes no sense whatsoever.

And yet one is compelled to keep reading to the bitter end. Just because the peanuts are stale doesn’t mean you can stop eating them.

*

Catherine Dain has halted (momentarily, one hopes) her seriesabout Keno-playing Reno private eye Freddy O’Neal to pen “Angel in the Dark” (Five Star, $19.95, 222 pages). Accurately subtitled “A New Age Mystery,” the novel introduces us to Mariana Morgan, a star-crossed young journalist whose prosaic existence ends abruptly with the death of her husband at the hands of an ATM mugger.

*

Aimless and depressed, she moves from Silver Lake to “the northwest corner of Los Angeles County.” There, she is drawn to a group of psychic friends who meet regularly for channeling, rainbow meditation and other New Age amusements.

As attuned as they are to the spirits, a dark force takes them by surprise and attacks them one by one. Dain is a clever, inventive author who is especially adept at exploring interpersonal relationships.

There’s a particularly strong subplot involving Mariana’s attempt to teach a community college course in American literature to a generally unresponsive class. Some readers may wish Dain had concentrated more on the down-to-earth lit class and less on the otherworldly manifestations, but fans of astrology, mirror spells and astral projection should relish every page.

*

Next week: Margo Kaufman on mystery books.