Charlatans by Robin Cook
I like Robin Cook's medical mysteries. He usually starts with a premise based in reality--the influence of pharma companies over doctors, cost cutting in HMOs, the scarcity of organs for transplants--and takes it to the extreme. In this book, the premise was a little shakier--how doctor training has not changed in over 100 years. (I personally felt by the end of the book that he had demonstrated why it shouldn't change, but that's just me.)
Anyway, Dr. Noah Rothauser is an extremely dedicated surgeon in Boston who has just been named super chief surgical resident. He is so dedicated in fact that he seems to have no life at all outside the hospital. One day, a surgical case goes extremely wrong and one of his duties is to investigate what happened for the hospital's Mortality & Morbidity meeting. The surgeon on the case, the egotistical Dr. Mason, blames the anesthesiologist, the mysterious Dr. Ava London--who blames the patient for eating breakfast before surgery even though he was told not to. Noah goes to Ava's house after work to discuss the case with her--and realizes he is extremely smitten. When another patient dies during surgery while Ava is the anesthesiologist, she once again says it was not her fault. By this time, Noah and Ava are romantically involved so he can't be as objective as he should be. Even so, he begins to have a few doubts about Ava's expertise. And the more time he spends with Ava, the more he realizes he doesn't know her at all. Soon Noah's own career is in jeopardy and possibly his life as he keeps seeing two strange men following him everywhere.
While this wasn't the best Robin Cook thriller ever, I did stay up way too late last night finishing it.
I foresaw one of the surprise twists at the end but not the other. I did notice a plot line that was sort of left hanging--about patients' hearts not starting up again during surgery after they had flatlined. I'm not sure if Cook forgot about that detail or just threw it in there as a red herring. I guess we're still waiting for the results from the pathologist.
Anyway, Dr. Noah Rothauser is an extremely dedicated surgeon in Boston who has just been named super chief surgical resident. He is so dedicated in fact that he seems to have no life at all outside the hospital. One day, a surgical case goes extremely wrong and one of his duties is to investigate what happened for the hospital's Mortality & Morbidity meeting. The surgeon on the case, the egotistical Dr. Mason, blames the anesthesiologist, the mysterious Dr. Ava London--who blames the patient for eating breakfast before surgery even though he was told not to. Noah goes to Ava's house after work to discuss the case with her--and realizes he is extremely smitten. When another patient dies during surgery while Ava is the anesthesiologist, she once again says it was not her fault. By this time, Noah and Ava are romantically involved so he can't be as objective as he should be. Even so, he begins to have a few doubts about Ava's expertise. And the more time he spends with Ava, the more he realizes he doesn't know her at all. Soon Noah's own career is in jeopardy and possibly his life as he keeps seeing two strange men following him everywhere.
While this wasn't the best Robin Cook thriller ever, I did stay up way too late last night finishing it.
I foresaw one of the surprise twists at the end but not the other. I did notice a plot line that was sort of left hanging--about patients' hearts not starting up again during surgery after they had flatlined. I'm not sure if Cook forgot about that detail or just threw it in there as a red herring. I guess we're still waiting for the results from the pathologist.
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