Face Down In The Park - Hardcover

In their second successful collaboration (after 1 Ragged Ridge Road), Tony Award-winning director Foglia (Master Class) and former cultural correspondent for the Washington Post Richards create as protagonist a man attacked in New York and robbed of his wallet, his identity and his memory. Having been knocked unconscious in Central Park, perhaps the victim of attempted murder, Brent Stevens is clueless as to his former life. When personal fitness trainer Tina Ruffo comes to his aid after he collapses outside the fabled Dakota apartment house, the aerobics maven from Queens finds that she can't resist helping the handsome stranger. Using the key to the hotel room found in his pocket, the pair discover his name and some salient facts, and begin to reconstruct his past and understand why he is now in peril. Meanwhile, out in Hollywood, Tinseltown's favorite golden couple, Jennifer Osborne and Christopher Knight, prepare for the premiere of their controversial new film, a figleaf-less adaptation of the creation story, which is stirring alarm among conservative religious groups. Gradually it is revealed that Brent's fortunes are tied to the stars through a blackmail scheme cooked up with slick Hollywood press agent Geoffrey Reed, involving compromising photos Brent had taken of the actors. Despite slow-motion character descriptions at the beginning and relentlessly chirpy but stiff dialogue, the authors' adept pacing and their smart parceling out of clues ratchets up the suspense. Given the authors' insider take on the entertainment industry, some of their West Coast creations are spot-on, with fictional interviewer Deborah Myers a perfect Barbara Walters clone. On the East Coast, however, while Brent makes an adequately credible befuddled hero, Tina's heart-of-gold tough cookie verges on the stereotypical and her constant exclamatory statements and interjectory tics ("Paula H. Prude!" "Jerry H. Seinfeld!") merely annoy. These cavils notwithstanding, this is a peppy story with appealing moments of celebrity titillation.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Foglia and Richards team up once again (1 Ragged Road, 1997), this time for a forgettable suspenser about amnesia. Just when you thought the a-ailment was safely secured in the Department of Puerile Plots, here's the bashed-in-the-head protagonist of Face Down in the Park. No memory, no identification, of course. Lucky for him, though, plucky, bighearted aerobics instructor Tina Ruffo is in the vicinity. He literally staggers into her; she whisks him off the mean New York City streets, then gets him to a hospital, where he's diagnosed with Global Transient Amnesia. But not to worry, the docs tell him. True, GTA can last months, but bits and pieces of his past might well come back in minutes. The first thing that comes back is his name, Brent Stevens. The why of the bashing, however, remains in limbo. A garden variety NYC mugging? Not on your Knickerbocker, since while still in the hospital Brent has narrowly avoided another violent episode. Clearly, he'd better find some answers. Tina pitches in with the sleuthing. A possible clue is the hotel key, as well as a train ticket, in one of Brent's pockets. The key leads the pair from Geoffrey Reed, viperous Hollywood agent, to movie idols Jennifer Osborne and Christopher Knightand eventually to certain dark secrets, the kind convertible into sleazy black-and-white photos, the kind bad guys might kill for. Or at the least consider head-bashworthy. Meantime, the train ticket leads to a small upstate town, where Brent Stevens discovers he once was Steve Carroll, someone with certain dark secrets of his own. Now, finally, cut to the glitz of a major movie premiere for resolution, redemption, and the requisite Hollywood-like ending. Foglia is a Broadway director, Richards a former cultural scene columnist for the Washington Post, but the inside stuff they dish here seems more warmed-over than hot. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.