I’ve been pleased, especially since I got my Kindle, to discover some writers who are lifting the Christian fiction genre to a higher level. When the Devil Whistles qualifies for that kind of praise.

Rick Acker’s novel centers on a young woman, Allie Whitman, who leads a sort of secret life, taking temporary jobs at corporations that do business with the government, nosing out fraud, and then filing lawsuits against them through a company of her own called Devil to Pay. She works closely with her lawyer, Connor Norman, who does the litigation while she stays anonymous. Each of them is attracted to the other, but any romance would spoil their profitable business.

Then Allie is caught out by an employer, a deep-sea salvage company. Instead of just firing her, they blackmail her into investigating another company, a business rival.

Unable to access any incriminating evidence on the second company, Allie panics and plants some, then flees to the Caribbean, leaving Connor looking both stupid and crooked, and nearly losing him his job. When he hunts Allie down and confronts her, she’s ashamed enough to set a rash plan in motion, putting herself in great danger, in order to try to redeem herself. Which eventually forces Connor to make a hard decision of his own about his priorities in life.

The quality of the writing and the plot are generally very high. My main criticism is what I see as a plot weakness. Allie is portrayed as a non-Christian, Norman as a Christian. I find it somewhat credible that Norman might put his career and life in danger for the sake of his soul (although even that would lower the story’s general credibility a little), but having Allie do that stretches probability. Even Christians rarely make the really big sacrifices. Usually, novelists solve this problem by raising the stakes—which is why you read so many stories where the hero dawdles and delays until his lover’s or his child’s life is actually in danger. I found it hard to believe that Allie, who isn’t even sure she has a soul, would walk into serious peril just to regain Connor’s respect. In real life, most of us just walk away from such choices, a little sad over our own cowardice. It’s a disappointment, but it’s the way we are.

Still, the book is well-written, and does not talk down to its Christian audience. Author Rick Acker works for the California Department of Justice, and writes knowledgeably of the world of whistle-blowing. Christian readers will find When the Devil Whistles delightful; non-Christians, probably less so, though I don’t think they’d be able to complain about preaching. Cautions for adult themes, though the language should be pretty acceptable to all.