A cautionary tale about traditional medicine that’s heavy on advice but short on storytelling.
A former attorney discovers her current dementia is linked to past multiple surgeries and a lifetime of poor nutrition in Briones’ (Jane Doe Overdose, 2015, etc.) novella, part of a series steeped in science.
Doris Finley is an “everywoman” who experiences cognitive decline after losing her appendix, uterus, ovaries, fallopian tubes, and gallbladder to a series of medical procedures. The surgeries, which began when Doris was just 4 years old, came fast and furious, and in most cases, doctors didn’t tell her about alternative treatments and neglected to provide proper follow-up care. She nonetheless proceeded through life, falling in and out of love, raising her children, and building a career. But as she aged, she continued to be dogged by poor health. As the novella opens, a confused Doris has just shoplifted from a gift store owned by retired nurse Grace Gallagher, who’s privy to many of the details of Doris’ medical history. An ensuing trip to the emergency room offers a ray of hope that Doris, now in her 60s, will finally receive the care she deserves. Briones doesn’t pull punches in this work. As a certified physician, she has the medical knowledge to make a convincing case that organ removal, poor post-surgical care, and a penchant for high-fat foods play a role in dementia. The story pinpoints cause and effect with precision; readers learn that Doris’ first operation, the removal of her appendix, likely reduced the amount of good bacteria in her gut—essential probiotics that could have helped her avoid a later health issue. The story posits that Doris’ hysterectomy, meanwhile, likely harmed her brain by depriving it of hormones that aid in mental acuity. The author is at her best when she sticks to problem-solving, and she offers intriguing medical insights—first through the character of Nurse Grace and later, through the eponymous Dr. Berta Briones, “a maverick in her field,” who appears in the final chapter. The story built around this central diagnosis, however, is easily forgettable and includes little character development. Readers interested in learning more about dementia could consult several nonfiction books that provide answers in a far less circuitous manner.
A cautionary tale about traditional medicine that’s heavy on advice but short on storytelling.Pub Date: March 15, 2014
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 12, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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