Death Duty »

Kate Verdi is working for the U.S. State Department as a death officer, assigned to deal with the deaths of Americans abroad. It's not the ideal job for an ambitious young woman who wants to ride the fast track in the Foreign Service, but it's a start. The paperwork ends suddenly when master diplomat Kendall Holmes steps into Kate's office and relieves her of two complicated cases - and promotes her into the Circle, a select group of the department's best and brightest. It seems too good to be true. It is. Despite her new job, Kate can't abandon her suspicions about two deaths she left behind: that of a female Foreign Service officer in a luxury hotel in Beijing, and another of a high-ranking State Department official on the meanest streets of Washington, D.C. Kate's questions lead to vague answers and bureaucratic runarounds, and she begins to suspect an elegant cover-up has taken place. Running through a labyrinth of lies, Kate realizes her own life is in danger, and she turns to the only one who will believe her - an unshockable and implacable black police detective who becomes her single ally. Their fight throws them against powers higher up than they could ever imagine and force Kate to take a no-win long-shot gamble...for her life.

Publishers Weekly

Kate Verdi is a junior "death duty" officer in the State Department's Citizen Emergency Center. Though gritty and smart, her blue-collar background puts her behind the curve in the class-conscious halls of Foggy Bottom. When the deputy assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, Patricia Van Slyke, dies in Beijing, presumably by accident (though from the prologue it's clear to readers that she was cruelly murdered), Verdi is assigned to determine the details of the death and to oversee the delivery of the remains to the family. Beginning with the arrival at Dulles Airport of cremated remains rather than a body, matters go awry for Verdi, threatening her career. Enter Verdi's old college chum, Lorna Demeritte, who urges Verdi to join a tight circle of well-born, ambitious and mutually supporting foreign service officers who will help her set her career back on track. When one of these officers receives Van Slyke's post, and another dies violently, Verdi is slowly drawn into a devious, dangerous and homicidal conspiracy. In his hardcover debut, Kimball (Red Days) writes intelligently and sometimes with power, but too many characters and a few too many diversions into Verdi's family life diffuse the suspense. Verdi makes a charming heroine, though, and the action scenes that fitfully propel the narrative are first-rate. (Dec.)