With a Vengeance
Eileen Dreyer

St. Martin's Press
March, 2003
Hardcover/0 pages
ISBN: 0-312-26577-8
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". . . capture . . . the nuances that makes the wheels of justice and injustice work."

". . . this book Dryer?s best . . ."

". . . Maggie can?t go away with the last chapter; the readers won?t let her."

“Write what you know” is the standard advice writers are often given and Eileen Dreyer, once a trauma nurse, has continually proven that this cliché has merit. Author of six other books, Dreyer has used her “behind the scenes” knowledge to set good suspense stories. In With A Vengeance, her latest hardback novel, Dreyer expands her scene-setting expertise of hospital nursing to SWAT team medics and the inner workings of the police department, managing to capture not only the technical aspects of this field, but the nuances that makes the wheels of justice and injustice work.

 

 

 

However, it isn’t the background or even the plot of discovering why the bad guys on “The List” are dying in the hospital for no good reason that makes this book Dryer’s best; it’s Maggie O’Brien, a nurse and medic on a SWAT team, who struggles with her demons created by her abusive ex-police officer father with strength, conviction and a wit that doesn’t stop. This protagonist created by Dreyer is so alive and vibrant she leaps from the pages into the reader’s heart and makes the reader demand more. Maggie can’t go away with the last chapter; the readers won’t let her. Surely Maggie can find more murders to solve.

Reviewer: E. M. Kurecka