John Case: Trance State

By MICHELE HEWITSON

What if the CIA's drug experiments of the Cold War had been privatised? What if they were expanded beyond studying the effects of mind-altering drugs to developing ways to control through mind-altering devices?

At the Institute of Global Studies young scientists are recruited to work for what is set up as a philanthropic organisation.

They're sent out into the field of their speciality interests after the elusive idea of "world peace."

Lew McBride is one of the foundation's stars, until he decides to strike out on his own. Bad move, Lew.

Adrienne Cope, a high-flying, low-paid young lawyer, is dealing with her sister's mysterious death.

And attempting to come to terms with her sister's last obsession: that the two had grown up in a foster-care family who had used them, and murdered another sister, in a satanic child-abuse ceremony.

How could memory become so distorted? And who is the strange psychiatrist who was treating her sister before she committed suicide?

Plenty here for conspiracy theorists but Trance State is better than that description and its airport blockbuster cover implies.

There's a nice tongue-in-cheek motif delivered deadpan throughout about the trance-inducing, brain-washing qualities of TV's talkshow queens, and some gritty observations on psychoanalysis.

Random House

$34.95