Sphinx

In Cook's first novel, Coma, beauteous young Susan Wheeler penetrated the black market in internal organs - and the result was a vivid, creepy medical thriller. In Cook's second novel, beauteous young Erica Baron penetrates the black market in Egyptian antiquities - and the result is an uninspired archaeological gothic, no worse but hardly much better than the standard run of the ruins. Egyptologist Erica, on vacation alone in Cairo despite the protests of male-chauvinist boyfriend Dr. Richard back in Boston, happens into a curio shop and charms the old shop-owner, who treats her to a glimpse of an incredible treasure: a jewel-encrusted statue of Seti I, the pharaoh who followed Tut (but whose grand tomb next door to Tut's was found empty). Then - the shopowner is cut-throated before Erica's eyes and the mysterious statue is stolen! Enter handsome Yvon de Margeau, who appears just in time to comfort the shaken Erica and explain to her about the black market that smuggles antiquities to rich buyers outside of Egypt; Yvon is dedicated to ending this outrage, an outrage that now astonishingly includes treasures of Seti I that were already missing when the tomb was first opened years ago! From this point on, it's gothic business as usual: various swarthy people are trying to kill Erica ("The American woman must be taken care of"); three men lust for her (Yvon, sudden arrival Richard, and culture bureaucrat Ahmed); and zealous Erica goes to Luxor, where she finds the widow of a workman from the Tut excavation and learns the secret of the real tomb of Seti I, a secret cache complete with a "treasure beyond comprehension." The secret itself is a let-down, the villains are transparent throughout, the wind-up action (Erica locked in a tomb, some gunplay) is routine, and the dialogue is often downright awful: "You keep forgetting that besides being a woman I'm an Egyptologist." Still, if you've never read an archaeology-gothic before, it's lively enough - so Coma readers drawn to this by Cook's byline will probably be only medium-disappointed. (Kirkus Reviews)