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FOURTH ANGEL
by Suzanne Chazin
Jove, February 2002
384 pages
$6.99
ISBN: 0515132497


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Georgia Skeehan, rookie New York City fire marshal and single mother has to continually fight sexism, department politics, and a wall of silence in order to learn to do her job properly. Her partner is black ex-marine drill sergeant 30 year NYFD veteran Randy Carter, and she is still wondering what he had done to land her as partner. They are called to a fire at 131 Spring Street. A fire that burned so hot and so fast that virtually nothing was left; a fire that killed 54 people and one fireman; a fire that melted the tar roof, splintered the foot thick old wood beams that held the building up for over 100 years, and turned concrete to glass. It was a fire that burned at almost 3000 degrees Fahrenheit, caused by a high temperature accelerant.

Upon investigation, Georgia learns that there have been other fires in New York that were probably HTA fires. Two of them were buildings that had been condemned by the City but had never been demolished. But this is the first with such a great death toll. And a brother firefighter was killed. That makes it even more personal.

Walter Frankel, head of the NYFD Criminal Forensic Lab puts Georgia onto the scent of the arsonist. He shows her letters all of which contain quotes from Revelations and all of them signed "The Fourth Angel" When she takes copies of these letters to the task force assigned to the latest fire, they claim never to have seen them before. Eventually, Skeehan is made head of the task force and the arsons and murders are solved.

Chazin is married to a Deputy Chief of the New York Fire Department, and has obviously used his expertise in delineating the operation of the NYFD. She has added to this a believable protagonist who has to balance work and attention to a fatherless 9 year old son, and a group of supporting players who must learn to work together to bring this case to a satisfactory conclusion.

Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, March 2002

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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