COITIONED

When a young reporter attempts suicide, a doctor finds himself once again chasing dangerous bad guys in this sixth volume of a mystery series.

A widower, father of two teenage daughters, and family physician, Dr. Sean Nolan cannot stay out of trouble. This time, just days shy of New Year’s Eve 2019, he receives a frantic call from the mother of globe-trotting investigative reporter ABCDE Garner, informing him that her daughter has cut her wrists and is now in the psychiatric ward of a San Francisco hospital. Within hours, Sean is on a plane to the Golden City. He and ABCDE have a history from a previous novel, and he holds the journalist’s health-care proxy. Employing his customary, irreverent jocularity, Sean signs the young woman out of the hospital and brings her back to his Woodhaven, Washington, home to recuperate. It turns out that after returning from an assignment in Syria, ABCDE began suffering from PTSD. Prescribed a recently approved anti-depressant, Serenetine, she subsequently began experiencing unusual side effects that were not described in the application for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention approval. Once Sean begins investigating the trial studies and notices an unusually high, unexplained dropout rate, he comes to the attention of Colton Pierce, head of security for Villarian Pharmaceutical, a drug manufacturer with potent connections and much to hide. Now, the game is afoot. Fortunately, Sean has a solid backup team of cohorts, including a powerful, behind-the-scenes player of his own. This amiable cast of secondary characters will be familiar to readers of the earlier volumes, but it is Sean, Johnson’s likable protagonist, always willing to color outside the lines when necessary, who gives the novel its energy. Sean’s enthusiasm for his new avocation as part-time amateur detective is infectious. Although the early sections focus on labor-intensive investigative efforts, the book gradually builds to page-turning action scenes. Dialogue and narration are tightly managed, with nary a wasted word. And the author adds a special chill to the evil pharma tale when he introduces the first signs of the Covid-19 pandemic to the plot. This sturdy installment certainly holds up as a stand-alone.

A well-crafted, disturbing, and entertaining medical thriller.