Authentic characters and a vivid hospital setting enhance a tense medical tale.
In this debut thriller, a Memphis anesthesiologist suspects a neurosurgeon of intentionally harming—and sometimes killing—patients.
Dr. Roxanne Roth has trained hard to overcome her fear of losing a patient while administering anesthesia. Her fiance, Mark, died five years ago during a relatively simple surgery. While she’s had no romantic interest since that tragedy, there’s currently a mutual attraction between her and the resident doctor she works with, Justin Kirkland. But she’s less fond of a surgeon she periodically assists: Dr. D.K. Webb. The medical executive committee has Webb under review after two of his patients had serious postoperative complications, including a stroke. Readers know that Webb has performed surgeries while intoxicated and is a regular cocaine user. When his carelessness leads to a patient’s death, Roxanne believes Webb purposefully made the fatal cut. Her new goal is to see that Webb’s medical license is revoked. Webb, meanwhile, is determined to wield the scalpel and maintain his drug habit. He’s an exceedingly dangerous man whose disturbing behavior soon captures the attention of other medical professionals as well as the authorities. As Webb’s misdeeds escalate, Roxanne attempts to involve the Drug Enforcement Administration, but Webb may find a way to target the anesthesiologist. Shiloah excels at character development. Roxanne, for example, is an empathetic protagonist who feels guilt over a patient’s death, even when it’s unquestionably Webb’s fault. Romance is delightfully complicated: Roxanne can’t help but compare Justin to Mark, and her earlier one-stand night with a co-worker may cause problems for her potential relationship. At the same time, there’s a growing uneasiness surrounding Webb, who seems to enjoy cutting patients and turns progressively creepier. Along with convincing dramatic moments, Shiloah writes astute and occasionally exhilarating hospital scenes that readers unfamiliar with medical jargon will effortlessly follow.
Authentic characters and a vivid hospital setting enhance a tense medical tale. (acknowledgements)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-73519-300-7
Page Count: 270
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: July 31, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Soapy, suspenseful fun.
A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.
Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.
Soapy, suspenseful fun.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227325
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.
A medical student is assigned an overnight shift to observe a Long Island hospital’s psychiatric ward and help with emergencies. You’d never guess what happens next.
Amy Brenner isn’t even interested in psychiatry, the one medical specialty she’s never considered for her own career. Nor is she interested any more in Cameron Berger, the classmate who ended their relationship so that he could spend more time studying, and she’s not pleased to learn that he’s switched his rotation with another student so he can spend some of the next 13 hours persuading Amy to rekindle their romance. Predictably, Cam will be the least of Amy’s troubles. Apart from Dr. Richard Beck and nurse Ramona Dutton, everyone else on Ward D is much more dangerous, from elderly Mary Cummings, whose knitting needles aren’t plastic but sharpened steel, to William Schoenfeld, who’s stopped taking the medications that were supposed to silence the voices telling him to kill people, to Damon Sawyer, who’s confined in Seclusion One and can’t possibly escape, unless a power outage neutralizes the locks. Most threatening of all is Jade Carpenter, whose close friendship with Amy ended eight years ago when Amy turned her in for what ended up being only one of a whole series of thrill crimes. McFadden measures out the complications, revelations, and betrayals with such an expert hand that readers anxiously trying to figure out whom Amy can trust as her goal shifts from ticking off a toilsome requirement to surviving the night may well end up wondering whom they can trust themselves. And isn’t provoking that kind of paranoia what medical thrillers are all about?
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.Pub Date: March 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227271
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
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