"A gripping thriller seething with vengeance"

Four-time RITA Winner Justine Dare rehashes the spousal abuse theme in her latest contemporary suspense with a twist. A murderer dubbed the Avenging Angel by the press has been slaying off abusers linked to Rachel's House which shelters battered women and is operated by beautiful Regan Keller. Lynne Graham is the detective piecing out the puzzle; Alexander Courts under the instructions of his mother is sent as an undercover aide to the unsuspecting Regan.

Ms. Dare's latest thriller is dark and gripping given the theme of abuse and jolting scenes of victimized women. Yet it is also psychologically more complexed and textured as Ms. Dare points out the flaw of such vigilante actions where one jealous and parochial wife took advantage of the system and ended up killing her husband indirectly. It teases our moral choices on whether to applaud the killer or solve them through the legal system. The romance budding between Alex and Regan provides an interesting diversion to the intriguing who-dun-it where new suspects with motives flashes steathily.

It is a romance with intelligence and Ms. Dare's experience as a cop certainly brings more credibility to the portrayal of Lynne and Drew who are detectives and ex- husband and wife left with feelings for each other. The lives of these characters engages us with dramatic highs - one tide after another - in this gritty pulsating thriller seething with vengeance.

Reviewed by Desmond CHan
Posted December 27, 2002

Summary

Now in her most powerful romantic thriller to date, Dare follows the trail of a killer who makes men pay for their crimes—with their lives. Newspapers dub him The Avenger, but to women at Rachel's House, a battered women's shelter, he's an angel. Regan Keller, the shelter's director, has access to records of each case of abuse—and that draws attention to her, making her the focus of two men.