Before I Wake

In this first-rate suspense novel from the author of Painkiller , physician Amy St. Clair, the widowed mother of two young children, has several problems. The cost-cutting officials of her New York hospital want to shut down the emergency operating room she heads, and she is being followed and threatened by a mysterious man. The affair she has begun with the psychologist who is treating her brain-damaged brother is complicated by the appearance of her long-lost first love. Amid indications that someone is prowling her home at night, she is haunted by nightmares that suggest she is repressing an awful memory. After the father of a friend from prep school unexpectedly dies of a heart attack in the ER, Amy learns that her friend has been having the same nightmare; soon she begins to suspect that her own wealthy father might be a candidate for a similar ``heart attack.'' Spruill mixes these elements and many others, including a missing Aztec statue, into a marvelous tale of mystery and menace that neither telegraphs its secrets nor falters in its pace. (Apr.)