Hope, Inc. by Loucinda Sullivan

http://www.amazon.com/Hope-Inc-Driscoll-Loucinda-Sullivan-ebook/dp/B00HGXAEAA

Countdown Deal March 14, 2014 through March 19, 2014

It was just another assignment. But when Dani Driscoll arrives to interview an immunologist about his extraordinary success in preventing breast cancer in mice, she finds him on his deathbed.

After the researcher dies as a result of injuries from a hit and run, Dani struggles to move on with her comfortable life, but something about this heartbreaking tragedy nags at her. She pitches a series of follow up stories about the disease and research, but her editor, a man she’s known her whole life, shuts her down.

When a colleague is also denied a story on the same topic, Dani becomes fixated, determined to find out why an issue so often celebrated in the press is suddenly off limits. Covering a political debate, she witnesses a senator and his campaign manager pocket dozens of envelopes, while denying any knowledge of the groundbreaking research.

Meanwhile, the devastated research team scrambles to secure funding under the name of a new principal investigator. They hire a grant writer recommended by a prominent figure in the fight against breast cancer, but soon suspect she was planted.

Plagued by fitful dreams, her suspicions grow until she uncovers a conspiracy to preserve corporate profits at the expense of the very women these corporations claim to save. Witnessing shameless greed, abuse of power, and a grand scheme to destroy the most promising hope of eradicating this disease, Dani is given a warning.

“Silence!”

Determined, she digs in without the use of her credentials, and interviews a cancer survivor desperate to save her little girls from the same devastating diagnosis.

Suspecting the researcher was murdered, she confides in her friend, a police investigator who promises to look into it. But, by the time he puts the pieces together Dani has been kidnapped, and is left to reason with her abductor, pleading for her life.

Whumpf! The unmistakable rumble of igniting fire reverberates through the abandoned building where she is gagged and bound tight, hopeless with the realization she’s been left to burn to death.

Heart-stopping action, and a last minute twist reveals a pervasive corporate conspiracy to deceive the world with the promise of hope.

Inspiration for Hope, Inc.

The seed for Hope, Inc. was planted one day when I was discussing breast cancer prevention with the Physician’s Assistant at my surgeon’s office. Brian was a police officer before becoming a P.A., and I guess that makes him cautiously suspicious. That conversation was the catalyst I needed, and I went home and started writing.

My experience with cancer provided a solid understanding of the treatment, but I didn’t want to write a memoir. Instead, I let my imagination explore the characters I’d develop in my mind.

My admiration for the breast cancer research developed by Dr. Vincent Tuohy of The Cleveland Clinic provided a basis for the story, though I’m happy to report that the good doctor is currently alive and well.

My next three novels will deal with different subject matters altogether. Dani Driscoll will return in two of them, and Viviana Beaumont will take the lead in a story set in Paris.