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Summary: The Dr. is in!
Review: This is the second book of Michael Palmer's that I have read and really loved it. The story centers around Dr. Jessie Copeland, a neurosurgeon who has helped develop a robot that can assist in brain surgeries. She is sought out by a villanous killer, Claude Malloche, who discovers he has a brain tumor and needs the best surgeon possible to operate on him. Malloche has been pursued for 5 years by a CIA agent named Alex, who would like nothing more than to see him dead. Posing as a security guard at the Boston hospital, Alex is on to Malloche's plan for surgery. The story becomes very exciting as the hospital is sealed off by Malloche's followers who have the go ahead to release a deadly gas if his surgery is not succesful. With all of this on Jessie's mind she has to perform delicate brain surgery using the robot ARTIE, which isn't quite ready to be used on living patients. Of course there is some romance tied in as Jessie is attracted to Alex, and added to the suspense it makes for a real good read. I will be looking for the other books by Michael Palmer soon.
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Summary: Another fine, suspenseful Palmer / innovative surgical plot
Review: We have enjoyed all of Palmer's previous medical thrillers, and quickly got hooked on this recent one featuring micro-robotic neurosurgery as a not too impossible current/future development in medicine. After a noted nuerosurgeon gets bumped off in the prologue, we are introduced to Boston doctors Jessie Copeland and her boss, Carl Gilbride, who are perfecting a tiny robot that has been engineered to perform brain surgery on malignant tumors. When a mysterious foreign criminal, Claude Malloche, needs such surgery, he soon takes hostage the entire hospital, and to an extent, the city of Boston, so that the surgeons will be forced to use this experimental technique to save his life. Can these docs and Alex Bishop, an FBI type whose brother was killed by Malloche, save the day, the hospital, and the city?To us, Palmer can take a plausible premise and extend it into a suspenseful story with aplomb. His characters are well drawn and his plots are just reasonable enough to avoid the far-fetched bin. Even if the ending is a bit predictable, it's fun getting there. We highly recommend this author and this entertaining story.
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Summary: A Medical Thriller...
Review: Michael Palmer is an M.D. that also happens to be a very good writter of suspense stories. And this is one of them. With the daily advances in medical research, the procedures in this book are not far off. But even more important. This book is a fun and fast read. you will be turning the pages to see what happens next. If you like suspense, read it. This medical thriller has a good plot that will keep you guessing. You will following the quest of an CIA agent who is after a villanius killer with single minded determination of a pit bull. And at the same time this killer is trying to find the best neurosurgen to remove a head turmor he knows has developed. The story really becomes engrossing as the killer choses his Doctor....
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Summary: Save the Killer, or Not, That is the Question
Review: Dr. Jessie Copeland, a gifted and respected neurosurgeon at one of Boston's leading hospitals, is dedicated to her work and to her patients, she is also at the forefront of developing a ground breaking technique that will revolutionize brain surgery. Claude Malloche is suffeirng from a brain tumor and wants Jesse to treat him with her new technique, but he's a ruthless killer. Jessie faces a serious dilemma, if she saves him, he'll undoubtedly go on to kill again. To ensure that Jessie do her level best, Malloche holds both the hospital and the city to ransom. If Jessie fails, hundreds of innocent people will die. Michael Palmer has written another pulse pounding medical thriller that drips with excitement, one you won't want to miss. Review submitted by Captain Katie Osborne
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Summary: Amazing Book!
Review: I usally don't read books such as this but thought to give it a try. Boy was I happy I did! It is a really good book that grips you from the first page all the way to the end! Read it! You will enjoy!
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Summary: The future of surgery?
Review: While I think this book was a little advanced for it's time, I don't think it's too far off. The book itself had a believable plot and strong characters. Although it's not one of his best books, it is a good read.
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Summary: Possibly Palmer's Best?
Review: Palmer's latest medical thriller conforms to all the classic sound-bites of book-cover blurb "a real page-turner" "unputdownable" "edge-of-the-seat" etc. Palmer knows how to thrill and uses his talent to great effect. I would argue that his prose is in a different (superior) league to Cook's, and his plots are more convincing. This book introduces a plot revolving around that most glamourous of medical specialties, neurosurgery. And of course this offers us the greatest opportunities for things to go wrong. The bit where the doctor lost control of the micro-surgery robot and... well, I won't spoil it for you... but suffice to say, the suspense is palpable. Palmer judges his medical details just right. Attempts at medical legitimacy such as "A slow-growing subfrontal meningioma with some extension..." may seem intimidating, but are no more so than an average episode of ER. How feasible is the idea of a micro-robot operating with simultaneous MRI imaging? Well, in retrospect, Crichton's oldest books that would have seemed like impossible sci-fi at the time, but they now look decidedly dated in comparison to the leaps and bound made by 21st century science fact. Overall the details fail to detract from the engaging plot and rather, they add to it. The book tries to be more than "merely" this rip-roaring thriller, and raises the ethical question "Do you save the life of a ruthless man who, if cured, will go on to kill and kill again?" We know what the "correct" answer is: everyone should be treated equally by the medical profession (especially if someone happens to be holding a gun to your head at the time and has threatened to nuke the city with deadly nerve gas). There is a further ethical conundrum: throughout the book the heroine (a neurosurgical registrar) has to deal with the fear that her boss is not competent at complex surgery. The story never deals with this problem adequately, and this is the only sense in which this book lets the reader down. In conclusion, the book is a great one, with a few minor flaws that barely blemish this stunning read.
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Summary: Always a good read
Review: I always enjoy Michael Palmer's books. They always provide a lot of information on cutting edge medical procedures. The only problem I had with this book was the abrupt ending.
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Summary: lacking in character
Review: The characters lack credibility and substance. Another example of an author substituting technical knowledge in the medical field for good writing.
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Summary: page turner all the way
Review: This is the first time I'm reading anything by Michael Palmer, and I must say how impressed I am. The first chapter neatly introduces the plot and the way it ends, catching the reader by surprise, sets the tone for the whole book. It gets better and more suspenseful halfway through, and you'll be flying through the final chapters, heart thumping wildly in anticipation of the climax. Characterisation was average but sufficient, and though the action almost never leaves the hospital setting, you will never get bored.
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