Katherine Howell - Frantic

I just finished reading* a great EMS-police crime/thriller written by Katherine Howell, a former Australian "ambulance officer." One of the main characters is a woman paramedic, the other is a female detective. The paramedic's husband, a police officer, gets shot and their baby is kidnapped. From that point on it is a nonstop rush to the conclusion. There are many EMS scenes -- as authentic as you will find in any book. While this is Howell's first novel, this is an incredibly accomplished thriller, filled with unexpected and shocking twists.



At the end of the book there is an excerpt from her next novel, Panic, that will be out in 2008. Like Frantic, it features a paramedic as a main character. While the book has not yet been published in the United States, it is being published in the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Russia, in addition to Australia. Hopefully, we can look forward not only to a US edition sometime soon, but many more EMS-related crime thrillers from Howell in the future.

Here's a link to an Australian on-line bookstore.

Angus & Robertson Books

Australian Crime Fiction Review of Frantic

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* I started the book at work yesterday, got 120 pages into it, and then was slammed with four back-to back calls to end my shift at 10:00 P.M. Fortunately this morning, I was able to finish it in a sitting.