"The Interpretation of Murder" by Jed Rubenfeld (Holt; $26).

Publishing insiders have been chatting up this first novel by constitutional scholar Rubenfeld for some time, especially after its publisher paid a reported $800,000 advance.

Buzz, however, does not always translate into popularity, and its sales figures have not lived up to expectations.

One of the problems with Rubenfeld's historical novel of sex and slayings is that it reads like many of its predecessors, most obviously "The Waterworks" and "The Alienist," creepy tales of mayhem in Old New York. There's also a whiff of David McCullough's history, "The Brooklyn Bridge."

"Haven't I read this before?" would be a fair question.

Rubenfeld had a clever premise: Sigmund Freud's only visit to America in 1909 to lecture at the new Clark University outside Boston and accept an honorary degree. He was joined by associates Carl Jung and Sandor Ferenczi.

The trip apparently soured Sigmund on the United States, and he never returned. Rubenfeld concocts a good reason why with his fantasy about sexual perversion in Manhattan that includes Pittsburgh's most famous pervert, Harry Thaw.

Rubenfeld employs an ambitious literary technique of alternating the first-person observations of his hero, fledgling psychiatrist Stratham Younger, with a narrative of dirty doings peppered with various real events such as the building of the Manhattan Bridge, a companion to the Brooklyn span, and the impending Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire.

If that's not enough, Rubenfeld stirs in elements of Freud's theories, Jung's dissatisfaction, "Hamlet" and New York politics. There are two or three books here, so please understand that I can't begin to round out the whole story in the space allotted.

The overall effect is to dilute rather than concentrate the details of the central story about a ravisher of young society maidens.

"The Interpretation of Murder" is a finely written and researched historical novel, but its appeal isn't wide enough to attract the host of readers who go for Patricia Cornwell or Anne Perry.

-- Bob Hoover, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

"One Good Turn" by Kate Atkinson (Little, Brown; $24.99).

After earning a modest reputation as a serious literary novelist with such books as "Behind the Scenes at a Museum," Atkinson headed for the greener pastures of crime fiction with the successful "Case Histories."

She makes another stab in "One Good Turn," a novel as eagerly anticipated as "The Interpretation of Murder," but you can stop holding your breath.

The crime angle, headed by the return of retired British cop Jackson Brodie from "Case Histories," is just a cover for Atkinson to try a Jane Austen turn on the plight of modern British -- Scottish, really -- women.

The result is a novel of contrivances, a bit too clever and quickly transparent.

The setting is Edinburgh during the city's legendary arts festival. Brodie is there to keep girlfriend Julia, a mediocre actress in a fringe play, company.

He witnesses a road-rage incident along with Martin Canning, author of a series of nostalgic British "cozies" (bland mysteries). When Canning breaks up the beating by hitting the bully with his briefcase, the tenuously drawn chain of coincidences starts to rattle.

Unhappy women are at the heart of this novel, from Gloria Hatter, neglected wife of a philandering developer, to Louise Monroe, a police inspector and single mother with a shoplifter of a son. Julia is also proving to be a disappointment as well.

In contrast to these worn-out Scots is a beautiful, cynical Russian dominatrix who has no illusions, but plenty of money-laundering skills. She gives Gloria a lesson in assertiveness training, lets Brodie know that she's more than he can handle and makes Louise's crime work and life seem boring.

Atkinson is cynic as well, and her withering asides about culture are fun, particularly her views on the publishing world through Canning, a name perhaps inspired by Victor Canning, a prolific British thriller writer.

Its mechanical plot, however, means that "One Good Turn" doesn't always deserve another -- read.

-- Bob Hoover, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette