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alifromkc1907's review against another edition
4.0
Gut Instinct Rating: 4
Characters: 3.75
Believability: 5
Uniqueness: 5
Writing Style: 4.5
Excitement Factor: 4.5
Story Line: 5
Title Relevance: 5
Artwork Relevance: 5
Overall: 4.63
Characters: 3.75
Believability: 5
Uniqueness: 5
Writing Style: 4.5
Excitement Factor: 4.5
Story Line: 5
Title Relevance: 5
Artwork Relevance: 5
Overall: 4.63
weaselweader's review against another edition
4.0
One more notch in Michael Palmer's belt!
Abby Dolan was a highly skilled female physician with plenty of upward mobility on the horizon at a major San Francisco teaching hospital. With no small amount of trepidation and introspection, she reluctantly changed jobs in order to be with her boyfriend, Josh, and accepted a position as head of the emergency room at Patience Regional Hospital, a much smaller hospital located in the mountains north of San Francisco that caters to the localized needs of the citizens of Patience.
It isn't long before Abby realizes that something simply isn't right. She's seeing an alarming number of NIWWs - her medical black humour shorthand for charting symptoms when she has "No Idea What's Wrong"! Like so many other small towns and cities North American, Patience is portrayed as an economic entity in which employment and survival depends on a single source. In this case, the driver is Colstar Industries, a battery manufacturer, that's part of the conglomerate empire belonging to multi-billionaire, Ezra Black. Colstar's survival, in turn, seems to depend in large part upon government contracts and the continued largesse of the incumbent senator.
As the plot began to unroll, circumstances begin to lead Abby into hypothesizing that Patience is being subjected to cadmium exposure by something or someone at Colstar and that the cause of her NIWWs is heavy metal toxicity. Uh oh ... I rolled my eyes and sighed, thinking I was wading into that aging medical thriller chestnut of the heroic sole practitioner waging battle against some evil megalomaniacal corporate demon. When Robin Cook first wrote Coma in 1977 almost single-handedly creating the medical thriller genre, this might have been new and exciting fare. But, since then, it's been beaten to death and I was convinced that Critical Judgment was bound to be a derivative dud.
How wrong could I have been? Even if the premise at its most basic isn't particularly new, Palmer's treatment of the story is exciting and fresh. Critical Judgment is a bona fide page-turning thriller with red herrings, lots of cliff-hangers, plenty of excitement and hold-your-breath moments plus an ending twist that nobody will see coming. Bravo, Michael Palmer!
His description of the professional politics and atmosphere of a small town regional hospital is interesting and informative with a clear ring of authenticity. In the context of a medical thriller, this makes for an innovative and most refreshing change from the usual setting of general hospitals in a major metropolis like Boston or Los Angeles. A regional hospital is clearly an entirely different environment with a multiplicity of challenges and opportunities that set it apart from its bigger city counterparts.
Last but not least, while we've seen other thrillers put a magnifying glass on surgery or obstetrics, for example, this is the first medical story I've seen that focused so completely on the emergency room. Even as the story was moving forward, Palmer treated his readers to a number of absolutely electric emergency room crises that put me into only one frame of mind - absolute awe at the skill and ice-cold decision making prowess of the medical staff that work in emergency room facilities across the continent.
Another great job, Michael Palmer! Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
Abby Dolan was a highly skilled female physician with plenty of upward mobility on the horizon at a major San Francisco teaching hospital. With no small amount of trepidation and introspection, she reluctantly changed jobs in order to be with her boyfriend, Josh, and accepted a position as head of the emergency room at Patience Regional Hospital, a much smaller hospital located in the mountains north of San Francisco that caters to the localized needs of the citizens of Patience.
It isn't long before Abby realizes that something simply isn't right. She's seeing an alarming number of NIWWs - her medical black humour shorthand for charting symptoms when she has "No Idea What's Wrong"! Like so many other small towns and cities North American, Patience is portrayed as an economic entity in which employment and survival depends on a single source. In this case, the driver is Colstar Industries, a battery manufacturer, that's part of the conglomerate empire belonging to multi-billionaire, Ezra Black. Colstar's survival, in turn, seems to depend in large part upon government contracts and the continued largesse of the incumbent senator.
As the plot began to unroll, circumstances begin to lead Abby into hypothesizing that Patience is being subjected to cadmium exposure by something or someone at Colstar and that the cause of her NIWWs is heavy metal toxicity. Uh oh ... I rolled my eyes and sighed, thinking I was wading into that aging medical thriller chestnut of the heroic sole practitioner waging battle against some evil megalomaniacal corporate demon. When Robin Cook first wrote Coma in 1977 almost single-handedly creating the medical thriller genre, this might have been new and exciting fare. But, since then, it's been beaten to death and I was convinced that Critical Judgment was bound to be a derivative dud.
How wrong could I have been? Even if the premise at its most basic isn't particularly new, Palmer's treatment of the story is exciting and fresh. Critical Judgment is a bona fide page-turning thriller with red herrings, lots of cliff-hangers, plenty of excitement and hold-your-breath moments plus an ending twist that nobody will see coming. Bravo, Michael Palmer!
His description of the professional politics and atmosphere of a small town regional hospital is interesting and informative with a clear ring of authenticity. In the context of a medical thriller, this makes for an innovative and most refreshing change from the usual setting of general hospitals in a major metropolis like Boston or Los Angeles. A regional hospital is clearly an entirely different environment with a multiplicity of challenges and opportunities that set it apart from its bigger city counterparts.
Last but not least, while we've seen other thrillers put a magnifying glass on surgery or obstetrics, for example, this is the first medical story I've seen that focused so completely on the emergency room. Even as the story was moving forward, Palmer treated his readers to a number of absolutely electric emergency room crises that put me into only one frame of mind - absolute awe at the skill and ice-cold decision making prowess of the medical staff that work in emergency room facilities across the continent.
Another great job, Michael Palmer! Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
apostrophen's review
3.0
I like Michael Palmer, I do, but I can cruise through one of his books in no time. They're easy, and the medical thriller is almost always thus: Doctor (or medial expert or somesuch) who has a semi-wobbly reputation sees too much and must risk their life to expose the medical mystery (which always involves murder to confuse medical research or some sort involving lots of money) - and, of course, success tends to come with a bit of a romance, too.
This one? The doctor is called Abby.
This one? The doctor is called Abby.
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