Murder in Paradise takes the idyllic backdrop of Hawaii and splatters the horrific story of a beautiful girl who is savagely attacked and left to die all over it. The great tragedy of this story is that it is not fiction - it is the true horror story that befell the Ireland family. It required nearly ten years of a father’s devotion to bring to justice the three males who brutalized and ultimately murdered his child.

The story does have its heroes in addition to Dana Ireland’s father: there is the Good Samaritan Ida Smith and the hospital staff who battled unsuccessfully to save the life of the twenty-three-year-old. She had little chance because it took more than three hours to get her to the hospital. The rescue personnel misstated her location and the fire dispatcher was too worried about damage to a fire engine to send it in to Dana, resulting in a critical delay in her treatment.

Once the police found the subhumans who ran over, raped, and bludgeoned Dana to death, Frank Pauline’s account of the atrocity is so matter-of-fact that it is bone-chilling. Only adults with strong stomachs should read this account, and even they should expect to be shocked and sickened.

The unwavering tenacity of Mr. Ireland and Detectives Guillermo and Marzo will reinvigorate your faith in the goodness of some portion of humankind, and it resulted in the three monsters' date with justice, of sorts. Two of the three received deservedly long sentences, but the third got off leniently.

Overall, Murder in Paradise is a heart-wrenching account of brief life, insane cruelty, vicious death, admirable dedication, and snail-like justice. It is a very good book about the tragedy that haunts the Ireland family, as it will you.