THE OCTOBER KILLINGS by Wessel Ebersohn (Umuzi, R195). Reviewed by Mike Oettle ARTS CORRESPONDENT

CRIMINOLOGIST Yudel Gordon has appeared in three previous works by Ebersohn. In this novel he teams up with brilliant young lawyer Abigail Bukula in a race to prevent the next in a series of killings.

Killings that all took place on October 22, in successive years – each man’s throat cut with piano wire.

Abigail has a block in her memory about the events of October 21, 1985.

That was the night of a South African raid on a house across the Lesotho border, in which her ANC activist parents were killed.

She recalls that one of the raiders did a noble thing that night, while the following night an ANC member did something repulsively evil.

What it was, she cannot recall, but she knows it was an operative called Michael Bishop.

On October 13, 2005, the ANC holds a reception in honour of Bishop, who fails to arrive.

Shortly after attending the reception, Abigail is visited by Leon Lourens, who as a boy of 19 had threatened to kill his commander if he shot Abigail and her fellow survivors.

The commander, a police officer named Marinus van Jaarsveld, has refused to apply for amnesty, and is held in C-Max.

Ebersohn weaves a taut thriller as Gordon and Abigail do their utmost to stop Bishop from making Leon the next October 22 victim – but can they find him in time? And who else will fall victim to the piano wire?

oettlem@avusa.co.za