Weekend Warriors / Payback

Weekend Warriors: As Nikki and her best friend, Barbara, are walking, a car comes out of nowhere and kills Barbara and her unborn child. Unfortunately, the driver, a Chinese diplomat, isn't subject to prosecution. Barbara's mother, the fabulously wealthy Myra Rutledge, who also raised Nikki, goes into a two-year depression, only snapping out of it when she sees television coverage of the mother of another murdered child taking the law into her own hands. Barbara and Myra recruit five female vigilantes, all victims of a legal system that, in their experiences, favored the criminal. The group's mission: to right the wrongs perpetrated against them and other women. The first woman to be vindicated is the one who was raped by three white-collar bikers while her disabled husband was forced to watch. Mission Impossible meets Lorena Bobbitt in prolific Michaels' latest, the first of the Sisterhood series. Readers who grow weary of seeing the bad guys get away with their crimes will enjoy seeing what happens when well-funded, very angry women take the law into their own hands. Payback: From the outside, it looks like Julia Webster lives a normal, happy existence. A highly successful plastic surgeon, she is married to a senator very much on his way up Capitol Hill, and lives in a lovely house in Georgetown. But appearances can be deceptive, as Julia knows only too well.