02387cam a2200265 4500 71443530 TxAuBib 20030421120000.0 030701s2003||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 2003271798 9780743206068 0743206061 TxAuBib CLARK, MARY HIGGINS. The Second Time Around / Mary Higgins Clark. New York : Simon & Schuster, 2003. viii, 302 p. ; 24 cm. Nicholas Spencer, charismatic head of the medical research company Gen-stone, involved in the development of an anticancer vaccine, suddenly disappears. His private plane crashes en route to Puerto Rico, but his body is not found. Early results of the vaccine seemed highly promising yet, coinciding with Spencer's disappearance comes news that the FDA is denying approval. Then follows the shocking revelation that Spencer had looted Gen-stone of huge sums of money. Marcia "Carley" DeCarlo, the thirty-two-year-old columnist for the Wall Street Weekly, is assigned to cover the story. Carley is the stepsister of Spencer's wife, Lynn, an aggressive PR woman and socialite, whom she dislikes and distrusts. The day after news of her husband's disappearance rocks the financial and medical world, Lynn attends a meeting of the stockholders of Gen-stone, flaunting expensive clothing and jewelry. Accused of having participated in the scam, she appears indifferent to the anger and despair of the people attending. That night, she narrowly escapes death when her mansion in Bedford, New York, is set on fire. She turns to Carley, begging her to use her investigative skills to prove that she was not her husband's accomplice. As Carley proceeds with her investigation, she is confronted by seemingly impenetrable questions: Is Nicholas Spencer dead or in hiding? Was he guilty or set up? Why the sudden reversal in medical opinion of the vaccine from recognition to condemnation? And as the facts begin to unfold, she becomes the target of a dangerous group involved in a sinister and fraudulent scheme. 20030421. Women journalists Fiction. Cancer Research Fiction. Missing persons Fiction. Embezzlement Fiction. New York (State) Fiction.