BRITISH NOVELIST WILLIAM BOYD will never be accused of taking the safe route. His new novel, The Blue Afternoon (Knopf; 373 pages; $23), is for the most part a superior piece of fiction with unusual, mostly immoral characters, plenty of suspense and a truly ghoulish surprise. Unfortunately, that story, set in Manila in 1902, doesn't begin until page 87.
Before that comes a sketch of a youngish architect, Kay Fischer, who is trying to launch a career in Los Angeles in 1936. She meets a man named Salvador Carriscant, who claims to be her father, and eventually she accompanies him to...
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