Love Her Madly
By Mary-Ann Tirone Smith
Henry Holt- Jan 2002
ISBN: 0805066489 - Hardcover
Suspense/ FBI

Reviewed by: Barbara Buhrer, MyShelf.Com
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When Poppy Rice, FBI investigator, watches convicted ax murderer, Rona
Leigh, being interviewed on TV by Dan Rather, she has difficulty believing that Rona's small hands could have wielded the ax.

In ten days Rona Leigh will be the first woman executed in Texas since the Civil War.

Poppy requests to be transferred from desk duty to field investigator so she can reopen the investigation. She finds many discrepancies and lapses in the trial and encounters ambivalence in the prison.

Rona Leigh claims to be a born again Christian, has married the prison chaplain, and is a changed woman apparently.

Poppy is unsuccessful in her attempt to save Rona Leigh from death by lethal injection. But "fate" intercedes and the lethal injection fails. Rona in convulsions is rushed from the prison in an ambulance; only to disappear.

Now it is Poppy's determination to find the escaped woman.

This is a tense drama; well-written with a well-crafted plot. The action is fast and full of suspense. It is a delight to read with clever dialogue.

With no effort the author has blended into the Texas atmosphere -adopting its mannerisms and garb with an apt and unflattering characterization of the Governor of Texas (George W. Bush?) and Texas politics; how they affected the future of the inmates of Death Row. The scene of the execution is most realistic and blood-curdling.

This is the first of a projected series featuring Poppy Rice. We can anticipate more enjoyment in the future.