Chris Niles: Vanished

Reviewed by MICHELE HEWITSON

Chic-lit meets crime lit. Sophie Graham, an aspiring actress, works in an up-market bar and doesn't have a life or any money. When Electra Jordon, rich, nasty and Sophie's one-time nemesis at their ritzy girls' school, walks into the bar with her wealthy father, Sophie invents a story about her career as a private detective. Electra goes missing. Daddy hires Sophie to find his daughter. Sophie takes over Electra's life: she sleeps at her apartment, wears her designer clothes and discovers there's much more to horrible Electra than a girl who spent her school years putting other girls' heads down the bog. This is bright and breezy stuff, with enough Sex and the City overtones (expensive clothes and stroppy single women) and a decent-enough plot to see you through a couple of brain-at-rest hours.

* Pan, $21.95