Yuan-Innes Melissa

Dr. Melissa Yuan-Innes works an emergency doctor at the Glengarry Memorial Hospital, Cornwall Cornwall Community Hospital, and CHEO. She was recently featured on CBC Radio for her book, The Emergency Doctor’s Guide to a Pain-Free Back. Her latest medical thriller, Stockholm Syndrome by Melissa Yi, hit the Kobo bestseller list and was featured on CTV's Regional Contact. She also writes award-winning fantasy and science fiction, and recently returned from Los Angeles as a finalist for the Roswell Award. Find out more at http://melissayuaninnes.com/

Article by Todd Hambleton
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14 November 2015

Local author Dr. Melissa Yuan-Innes will launch her newest medical thriller,
Stockholm syndrome, on December 6, at the Cornwall Public Library.

Could a hostage-taking incident occur at Cornwall Community Hospital or the Glengarry Memorial Hospital in Alexandria?

Of course it could, says Dr. Melissa Yuan-Innes, who practises emergency medicine at both facilities.

"Canadians tend to be trusting," Yuan-Innes said. "Cornwall has security and we do lock the main doors at both hospitals at night, but it just funnels people through the emergency room, where they can wreak havoc ... I know of at least two emergency nurses and an emergency room attendant who were assaulted last year, one of whom needed surgery afterward.

"That's not counting the man who was charged with attempted murder after attacking a nurse with a metal bar."

Dr. Yuan-Innes is also an author, specializing in the medical thriller genre and she's inviting trauma and security experts to the launching of her next book, Stockholm Syndrome, on Dec. 6 at Cornwall Public Library at 2 p.m.

"It was a 1991 incident at a hospital - where a man named Richard Worthington planted sticks of dynamite outside, then entered the labour and delivery area armed with a shotgun and a handgun - that Yuan-Innes heard about and immediately recognized it as the inspiration for her newest thriller.

"After a scary night shift, I started researching hostage-taking at hospitals," said Yuan-Innes in a news release about her upcoming book launch.

"As soon as I heard about a woman forced to give birth at gunpoint, I knew I had to write about it ... Worthington kept two nurses, the woman, her partner, their older daughter and their newborn daughter hostage. A third nurse wrestled the shotgun away from him, but he shot her in the back with the handgun.

"Most people are good, but what would you do if you were confronted with an active shooter? Life can change in an instant. Let's talk about this in fiction and in real life."

The author plans some lighthearted moments as well.

"I'm asking people to wear blue and yellow, 'the colours of the Swedish flag, for the Stockholm in Stockholm Syndrome," said Yuan- Innes, who writes her thrillers under the name Melissa Yi. "And we'll be serving a non-alcoholic version of Swedish glogg."

Yuan-Innes, a mother of two who lives in the Glen Nevis area in South Glengarry, has been a prolific writer for over a decade, eBooks and 20 novels and novellas, including medical mystery Terminally Ill, which was launched last spring at the libraries in Cornwall and Alexandria.