Cries in the Dark was a very difficult book to read.  And that's good.  Let me explain.

The book is about a topic most of us avoid thinking about because it's just easier not to know how our medications, cleaning products and make up get to us, and the cost in life - animal life.  I don't want to make this into a political discourse and neither does P.A. Woodburn.  The story is just about the fact that animal testing is done, and in this case, it goes too far. 

This book will make you wince and squirm.  It should.  It's about testing on animals, it's about vivisection, and it's about people who can justify cruelty to animals and humans if the payoff is big enough. 

It's also about people who believe in doing the right thing, if they can, and doing things they never knew they could.

Alex can talk to chimpanzees.  She can understand them.  Not just with sign language, but telepathically.  And when prostitutes start dying and chimpanzees start disappearing, it seems she is the only one who can help.  Instead of focusing on solely on her education to become a doctor, she turns into a sleuth, learns to hack into computers, learns to shoot a gun, and sets off in grim determination to save lives - human and ape. 

You should read it.  P.A. Woodburn doesn't pound the reader over the head with slogans and rhetoric, merely builds a story around the facts and leaves it to the reader to draw his own conclusions. 

Next week:  Sudden Death, Michael Balkind.

Ms Pupps