Not so coincidentally, her heroine, Dr. Rae Duprey, is an African-American obstetrician and vice chair of the OB department of a fictional Berkeley Hills hospital. Dr. Duprey's personal and professional lives are driven by a childhood experience.

"Rae's mother had bled to death giving birth to a stillborn baby boy in the back of an ambulance. At thirteen years old, she had witnessed the whole thing, and at the funeral, she had made two decisions. One, that she would become the world's greatest obstetrician so that no woman would ever have to go through what her mother did . . . From that day on, she was no longer a little girl. At her mother's funeral, her stern father forbade her to cry. Not a single tear, he warned. So she had swallowed her grief and buried her feelings deep in her soul. Then, methodically and meticulously, she went about pursuing her own ambition. And she had never looked back. Not once."

At 38, Dr. Rae Duprey is on the threshold of achieving her goal of becoming the first woman and the first Black woman to head the Obstetrics and Gynecology Department at the prestigious Berkeley Hill's Hospital. But her goals are being short-circuited on two fronts.

The hospital board decides to close the Obstetrics Department in favor of expanding the more lucrative Cardiac Department. And her career is jeopardized by a growing number of routine deliveries that are developing problems between the hospital and a nearby Birth Center. The Birth Center is owned by her current boss and former lover, Dr. Bo Michaels. The board has given Dr. Duprey just two weeks to justify the department's existence. She has less time to find out the reason for the increase in the number of "bad baby" cases. The lives of the babies, mothers and people who may know the truth are in danger.

Margaret Cuthbert has crafted a suspenseful medical thriller that holds the reader's attention until the very end. There are a number of people who have a vested interest in having the obstetrics department close. So many suspects and so little time. Who can it be?

In Dr. Rae Duprey, we have a paradox. Dr. Duprey is tough, committed, feisty, arrogant and a bit of a hothead. She's got a soapbox she rarely puts away. One character has to ask her "Would you just quit being Doctor Duprey for two seconds, please?" But Dr. Duprey is also vulnerable, naive and blindsided by her commitment. We see a softer side in her interactions with her best friend, Nurse Bernie Brown, with her patients and with her love interest. She is at her best in the operating room and unabashedly gushes "Delivering babies is my life."

In addition to giving readers a gripping medical thriller, Cuthbert has issued an indictment of the health care delivery system which forces hospital administrators to pit the interests of doctors and medical service departments and patients against one another.

Margaret Cuthbert has crafted several gritty operating room scenes that are not for the faint-at-heart. Her experience brings the language and descriptions up close and personal. There are several flaws that can be chalked up to a new mystery writer on her first time out. They in no way diminish the enjoyment of The Silent Cradle.

It's a good start by a new author.

--Gwendolyn Osborne