FROM AMAZON: In the short novel The Anastasia Syndrome, prominent historical writer Judith Chase is living in London and preparing for her marriage to Sir Stephen Hallett, expected to become England's next Prime Minister. Orphaned during World War II, Judith wants to trace her origins. In this quest, she goes to a renowned psychiatrist and becomes the victim of his experiments in regression. When a woman in a dark green cape sets off bombs in London, Sir Stephen and Judith are faced with an intangible, mysterious force threatening their very existence.

Obsessive love is the subject of Terror Stalks the Class Reunion; psychic contact with a dead twin sister is the only defense against a murder in Double Vision; Lucky Day, compared to O. Henry's The Gift of the Magi, begins premonition of imminent danger; in The Lost Angel, mother follows her intuition in a harrowing search for her missing child. ( )

My favorite story in this collection was Lucky Day. ( )

good @ returning soul in other's body

In the title novella, a woman is forced to confront the demons of her past as a haunting sense of deja vu inexorably draws her toward the terrible truth about a wave of terrorist bombings. The remaining four stories in the collection are all miniature masterpieces of suspense.

The Anastasia Syndrome is a well-written, psychological thriller about a woman who assumes the identity of a historical figure she’s researching. What may have begun as a standard case of multiple personality disorder (instigated, perhaps, by long hours spent in the library) becomes something of a possession by the long-dead murderess, and Judith must fight to take her life back or lose herself completely.

Terror Stalks the Class Reunion tells the story of a man’s lasting obsession with an old high school sweetheart and how “true love” never wanes. A wonderful look into the head of a stalker.

Lucky Day follows a woman’s investigation of the disappearance of an older gentleman friend – a disappearance her own befuddled husband may be at the very root of.

Double Vision follows a killer’s return to correct a mistake made years ago: he only learned he killed the wrong sister after it was too late. Or did he? They look so much alike.

The Lost Angel, told from the point of view of the angel and her frantic mother, depicts a criminal father’s ultimate con: kidnapping his daughter to enhance his fraudulent schemes.

This collection of short stories is proof that Mary Higgins Clark is just as capable of keeping me on the edge of my seat with a terse, pithy story as she is with her traditional full-length suspense novels. ( )

one of my favorites! ( )