-"No Way Back" by Andrew Gross; Morrow (352 pages, $27.99)

In Andrew Gross' seventh thriller, a woman's near-brush with adultery propels her into a conspiracy that will nearly ruin her family and make her a murder suspect.

"No Way Back" barely allows its heroine Wendy Gould a chance to catch her breath as she goes on the run to escape criminals, the police and high-ranking government officials following her on a cross-country trek. "No Way Back" features plenty of action - both believable and implausible - and a plucky heroine whose indiscretion throws her into out-of-control situations. But as brisk as "No Way Back" is, Gross' novel reads like the literary equivalent of a Lifetime channel movie: manipulative, substituting action for character development, but oh, so entertaining. "No Way Back" works well as a straight-out thriller.

An aspiring author, Wendy is in New York City for a self-publishing seminar, hoping to learn how to launch her book. Still quite mad at her husband, Dave, over the argument they had the previous day, Wendy is waiting for a girlfriend to join her for a drink at a hotel bar. Her friend can't make it, but Wendy begins to talk to Curtis Kitchner, a freelance journalist. Against her better judgment, Wendy accompanies Curtis to his hotel room but stops before they consummate the affair. While in the bathroom, Wendy overhears Curtis and another man arguing before Curtis is shot. Defending herself, Wendy shoots the intruder, whose badge identifies him as a Homeland Security agent. The panicked Wendy flees to her New Jersey home. But the quiet life she led with her husband and two grown stepchildren, whom she raised since they were in grade school, vanishes when she is accused of the double murder.

With federal agents on her trail, Wendy goes underground to clear her name. Her situation meshes with that of Lauritzia Velez, a 24-year-old Mexican woman who is being hunted by gunmen employed by drug cartel honcho Eduardo Cano. In parallel stories, Gross illustrates how these two women survive on the run while living off the grid.

A clever plot sustains "No Way Back" as Gross throws in plenty of twists and turns that, even if they are predictable, still ratchet up the suspense. An underlying theme of the innocent victims of drug violence further sustains the plot. And although the characters would be at home in a cable-TV movie, Gross' energetic storytelling makes the reader become invested in their fate.

-"Murder Below Montparnasse" by Cara Black; Soho Crime (336 pages, $25.95)

An evocative setting often becomes more than just scenery in a mystery - it becomes a character, setting a tone, an atmosphere and dictating the action.

Paris continues to be as much of a character as any fictional person in Cara Black's quite engaging series. And, as usual, Black's 13th novel delivers a view of Paris that is off the beaten path, weaving in the arrondissement's history and its atmosphere to enhance her solid plotting and appealing characters. "Murder Below Montparnasse" is set in an unfashionable area, once considered boho-chic during the 1920s. Now this 14th arrondissement resembles "a leftover 19th century industrial Paris full of artists, publishers, bric-a-brac traders and craftspeople who saw themselves as the memory keepers of a time now forgotten."

Paris private detective Aimee Leduc has come to Montparnasse to meet with Yuri Volodya, an elderly Russian who maintains that he knew her mother, Sydney. Aimee could care less about the valuable painting that may be a Modigliani that Yuri wants her to protect; she needs to know about her mother who abandoned the family when Aimee was 8 years old. But the case has barely begun before the painting is stolen and her client is murdered. Events turn even more violent when Aimee becomes the target of aging French political factionalists, Serbian thugs and Russian mobsters. While Aimee normally works with a team, this time she is on her own because her partner, Rene Friant, has been lured to California by a Silicon Valley firm, and her part-time hacker is sidelined following a car accident.

Set in 1998, "Murder Below Montparnasse" moves at as brisk pace as Aimee who quickly moves through the Parisian streets on her pink Vespa. The complicated Aimee's obsession with her missing mother often gets in the way of her normally rational thinking. Aimee's uncompromising personality serves her well, and woe to the assailant who thinks he can get away with tearing the ever-fashionable detective's vintage Yves Saint Laurent jacket.

Black's affectionate descriptions of Paris will make readers want to book the next flight out. And the author wants readers to enjoy the City of Lights. Black currently is running a contest to take 15 readers with her on a trip to Paris. Details are at www.parisisformurder.com.

-"Criminal Enterprise" by Owen Laukkanen; Putnam (416 pages, $26.95)

The economic downturn might not seem to be the stuff of an exciting thriller. But Owen Laukkanen has made the economy woes his genre niche while creating action-packed stories that also are contemporary cautionary tales.

"Criminal Enterprise" works well as an in-depth police procedural as well as a vivid look at amorality, entitlement and consequences. Laukkanen shows how a person who defines himself by his possessions, job and place in society might turn to crime to protect his status.

While Laukkanen makes us care about his finely drawn characters, he never makes the criminals in his story totally sympathetic. The reader's allegiance always is firmly on the side of the real heroes of "Criminal Enterprise" - FBI agent Carla Windermere and Minnesota state cop Kirk Stevens whose insight serves them well.

Accountant Carter Tomlin has the good life in St. Paul, Minn. - a beautiful family, an expensive mansion and a new sports car in the driveway. It takes a big salary to keep up with the huge mortgage and the bursting-at-the-seams credit card bills. And Carter had all that. Until he lost his high salary when his firm laid him off. But rather than downsize, as have so many Americans, Carter finds a more lucrative job - robbing banks. At first, Carter tells himself he is doing it to protect his family, but the robberies have unleashed another side of him. As the heists become increasingly more audacious, and violent, Carter becomes addicted to the danger and the power this criminal enterprise brings. "Couldn't just jump back into some day job again, some civilian life. Not when he had tasted the alternative."

While Carter's background makes him an unlikely suspect, Carla sees through his ruse and goes against her FBI supervisors to prove her theory. But she has no trouble convincing her colleague Kirk, who knows how acute her instincts are.

As he did in "The Professionals," his excellent 2012 debut, Laukkanen moves "Criminal Enterprise" at a brisk pace, while the reader is enthralled and repulsed by Carter's pretentious attitude and risky behavior. Although a final showdown goes a bit over the top, this flaw doesn't dilute Laukkanen's powerful story.

"Criminal Enterprise" showcases Laukkanen's original storytelling. We can't wait to find out which everyman-turned-criminal Carla and Kirk tangle with next.

• Read more articles by OLINE H. COGDILL

Order Reprint