THE THIEVES' OPERA

THE THIEVES' OPERA Lucy Moore (Harcourt Brace, $25) English criminal mastermind Jonathan Wild invented the ''double-cross'' and the modern crime empire, blackmailing members of his ''Corporation of Thieves'' and its victims with equally ruthless abandon. In 1724 Wild announced he would catch cat burglar Jack Sheppard, folk hero to London's exploited underclasses for using Houdini-like maneuvers to repeatedly escape from notorious city prisons. Their fates prove so karmically appropriate they'd be unbelievable in a novel -- but they constitute a rip-roaring historical chronicle. Colorful digressions abound: Whether rendering the eccentric nobility (place settings at formal dinners included chamber pots) or nose-slashing street gangs, Moore makes an irresistible guide to Enlightenment Europe's most luxurious, sordid, and violent city. B+