Some of the peculiarities of Ashes to Ashes can be understood if one takes into account Hoag's development as a novelist. Her first novels, Magic (1990), Sarah's Sin (1992), and Lucky's Lady (1992), were more typical romances—they involved a degree of suspense, but nowhere near as much death as her later work. As her career has progressed (Cry Wolf [1993], Dark Paradise [1994], Mght Sins [1995], Guilty as Sin [1996], A Thin Dark Line [1997]), Hoag's novels generally have oscillated between romance and suspense, but they also have become increasingly gory and violent. Ashes to Ashes is perhaps her most extreme novel yet, but it is interesting to note that it retains a few passages of prose that are very much in keeping with the romance genre.

Hoag has also just published a sequel to Ashes to Ashes—appropriately titled Dust to Dust—that continues to chronicle life in the...