Gray Matter

Rating:
Summary: Super read!!
Review: Why have I never heard of this author before? This is one of the most gripping medical thrillers I have read...beter than Cook, Chrichton, Gerritsen!!. I have ordered his Elixir. , also Rough Beast under his other name. Read and enjoy!!

Rating:
Summary: Meh.
Review: I guess one of my biggest pet peeves is when authors have a great idea and fail to capitalize on it. Here we have a compelling subject -- raising IQ (but maybe not legally). But the author would rather drown this great idea with a bunch of hokey plot "twists" and cartoonish characters. Perfect example are two of the children. Dylan, the one who needs an IQ boost, is the sweetest, sweetest boy ever. He can do no wrong. His foil, Lucinda, is quite the opposite, evil incarnate. For cheap shock value, she does something very bad to her new pet kitty.

Characters' motivation or logic is never clearly understood. Rachel, the protagonist, must hide her intentions from her husband. Why? She says she fears it is her fault Dylan isn't so bright. But that fact alone barely covers the tremendous lengths she goes to deceive. And Dr. Malenko? Yeah, I understand what he is doing is profitable, but after dozens of children have disappeared and dozens of the newly "smarter" kids turn out severely disturbed, how is he still in operation?

"Gray Matter" is mostly a ridiculous read salted with a few genuinely tense and moving moments. Braver is okay, but in no position to unseat Robin Cook as the king of medical thrillers.

Rating:
Summary: Disturbing And Credible
Review: Gray Matter is a nail biting, fast paced, bone chilling, page turner. Gary Braver takes the reader on an emotional roller coaster! The plot grabbed hold of me and never let go, even after I finished the book. The story is so thought provoking that I found myself in tears as I read the last page. The grass isn't always greener on the other side.

Gary Braver (Goshgarian) has done his homework. He thoroughly researched his subject matter, obtaining information from psychologists, neurologists, medical examiners, and police personnel. His characters are intentionally planned, as each character stands true to the significance of their given names. The characters are so real I became personally involved with each of them. I found myself worrying about what lengths the characters may go to reach their desired goal. Rachel feels guilty that she caused her son's learning disability and Malenko plays on that guilt. I wanted to jump into the story and scream at Rachel, "NO, NO, don't change a hair on his head. You will regret it!" I wanted to smack selfish Sheila and make her tell Rachel the truth about what the enhancement procedure cost her daughter, and would inevitably cost Dylan. I wanted to murder Dr. Malenko myself for his manipulative, callous way of dealing with human beings. I was concerned for the underdogs. I fell in love with Dylan, a sweet, learning disabled boy, who could sing like an angel. The altered children, who have no idea what has happened to them. I cried for Lilly whose intelligence, and very life, is stolen to enhance another. I cheered for the caring, somewhat obsessed Police Detective Greg Zakarian. He risks his career in search of answers and helps unfold the gruesome truth about the enhancement procedure.

I love the way that Braver brings the Massachusetts setting to life, Cambridge, Boston, Hawthorne, and Cape Cod. I lived in the Boston area and I found myself following the characters through scenic New England. Now I live in San Jose, California, the "Heart of the Silicon Valley," where the technology in Gray Matter seems so possible. Sometimes, scientific research seems to challenge morality. The details of the surgical procedures made the enhancement procedure seem frighteningly realistic. Could this really happen? Would we ever perform this "Frankenstein like" intelligence altering surgery?








Rating:
Summary: This could become a reality...
Review: I bought Grey Matter for entertainment. It became much more to me as I flew through the pages. It was not only thought provoking, but terrifying in the fact that something like this could happen to the average American family in the not too distant future! Perhaps even now! The emphasis on that statement is "average". Never have I read a book that was so easy to identify with. Gary Braver gets inside your head and brings to light one's deepest and darkest fears.

Rating:
Summary: GRAY MATTER, an elixir to the common medical thriller...
Review: In Gary Braver's new medical thriller, he explores the realm of intelligence in children and how parents can intervene and perhaps enhance the intelligence of their learning disabled child. Maybe even make him or her a genius. He shows us what might happen if parents' prayers are answered. (We've come to learn the potential danger of answered prayers.)
In addition to the thriller elements of the story - a charismatic, if mad, scientist, Dr. Lucius Malenko, child abductions and murders, a dogged police detective and a summer camp of Stepford-kid geniuses - all along the way we learn how the brain functions, the nature of intelligence and the real possibilities of enhancing that intelligence sometime in the future.
We learn these things through the trials and heartbreak of the character Dylan, a loveable but learning disabled 6 year old whose parents are contemplating bringing him to Dr. Malenko's clinic for the secret enhancement process. Dr. Malenko charms the parents into accepting why this process isn't endorsed by the medical establishment and must therefore remain secret. A bit of subtle blackmail, ultimately, seals the deal. And of course, the parents want to believe Dr. Malenko because they want the best for Dylan.
As he was in ELIXIR, Braver is again top notch in controlling the elements of this many-faceted story. He kept me turning the pages in anticipation of what was coming next, and surprised me at every turn. I rooted for the detective who slowly puts the pieces of the puzzle together. And I rooted for Dylan's mother, who is tortured within because she might be responsible for Dylan's learning disabilities, to come to her senses. And most of all I rooted for little Dylan, as likeable a kid as your likely to find in fiction.
I've been casting the movie version of this novel in my mind since finishing it. Those who like medical thrillers are going to love this exceptional one. I can't wait to see what Braver has in store for us next time!

Rating:
Summary: Thinking Persons' Horror
Review: As a fellow writer and voracious reader of horror, I was thrilled to discover Gary Braver's Gray Matter. I love reading medical thrillers, but this was the first time I had come across a book billing itself as combining the genres of medical thriller and horror. And Braver does it so very well. The premise hits chillingly close to home, even for readers such as myself who don't have children. What if you were given the opportunity to make yourself smarter? Would you take it no matter what the cost?
Braver's writing is a joy to read. It flows smoothly and seamlessly, which to me is the hallmark of a good writer. His characterization of Dylan (the slow child whose parents want to give another chance) is painfully poignant. And his mastery of his craft is nothing short of brilliant. Braver has just shot onto my short list of must-read writers.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting.. but where are the fire works?
Review: I read it because of the 5 star rating this book received from the Amazon reviewers. Rarely, I find Amazon 5 star rated books not living up to its "5 star" status but this one was a bit of disappointment. Not that this book is terrible, I just didn't see it as a "5 star" book.

I will not go into summary of the book but if you have a problem reading about rich people having rich people's problem, this book is not for you. As for me, I like the average Joe going against insurmountable odds and this book isn't it.

After reading the book summary and the title, I thought this book would a twisted human version of Dean Koontz's "Watcher" (if you have read it, you will know what I mean) but it wasn't. It was a light read without the BANG! one would expect from a 5 star book.

If you are interested in twisted or.... messed up "GRAY MATTER" with some nice juicy story and good characters, start with the "FIRE STARTER" by Stephen King.

Rating:
Summary: How far would you go to increase your child's IQ?
Review: I just finished Gray Matter by Gary Braver, paperback, currently in its first printing. I was in the mood for a PrestonChild novel, but I have read all of them and wanted something new.

Gray Matter is considered a thriller, but as a parent, it gave a different perspective.

Premise: What if your child was slow or learning disabled, maybe it could even be your fault from experimenting with drugs when you were a teen ... how far would you go to take your child from a low IQ to a high one? How important is that IQ compared to the personality of your child? Would you risk it?

Meanwhile, there are children being kidnapped, maybe murdered. There is a cop, a widower, that can't let go of a Cold case that has only a child's oddly damaged skull found washed up on the beach, but no missing child report.

How important is IQ to the quality of life we all want for our children? Obviously a person has to have a decent IQ to make it in the real world; I'm not talking prepackaged boy bands or former Mouseketeers here, I mean regular people trying to make a decent life for their child.

When our children are still young, say less than ten years old, they are quite different from their teen years or as adults. As parents we try to plan ahead for the very best for them. Naturally parents want their children to do better than they themselves have ... we want the best for them. Deep down, every parents suspects that their child or children, is actually amazing, wonderful, and has potential that may not be obvious to the world at large ... but *we* know it to be true.

The question remains: how far would you go to increase your child's IQ, so that they can have the best life possible? Does IQ count more than anything else?

The blurb reads:
Rachel Williams and her husband have everything; a big new house in a fancy Boston suburb, all the brand-name toys that go along with wealth, and best of all, a gorgeous, sweet little six-year old son named Dylan.
But Dylan has learning disabilies. Although intelligence isn't everything, Rachel fears her son will grow up never fully appreciating the wonders of life. Tortured by the idea that something she did in her past caused Dylan's problems, Rachel becomes obsessed with a secret - and expensive - medical procedure that claims to turn slow children into geniuses.
Should she and her husband sacrifice their new fortune on the risky, experimental procedure for the sake of their son's happiness? Unaware of the real consequences of the brain enhancement procedure, Rachel can't know that the costs of the operation are far more than finanical.

Having raised my own, as well as fostering a few children with ADD or ADHD, I know how frustrating it can be to try to get through to our children the importance of their educiation. The meds only work if the child works with them. And when they are so young, they cannot really grasp the concept that what they are learning is more than just how to fit in, and all of the school politics. A personal sacrifice, for instance, giving up my own dreams of freelance writing and photography, to be a full-time wife and mother was a fairly easy choice. Losing my vision took the photography part out of my hands anyway, although I didn't know it at the time.
But a greater sacrifice, say of one family member over another, is quite a different matter.

Personally, I woud rate the book around four stars.
The concept, and the thought behind it, I would rate higher. I recommend this book, and ask my fellow parents ... how far would you go, if you had a slow, or MBD, or LD child, to give her or him a genius IQ? Or even average?

The font is easy on the eyes, not a fine print novel that causes eye-strain; important to anyone that is visually impaired.

Please forgive my punctuation here; quotation marks or parentheses add a bit of a garbled mess into the text, so I have removed them.

Thank you.