[Natural Causes] by Michael Palmer
3.5★'s

From The Book:
Dr. Sarah Baldwin races to a Boston hospital with a young woman whose normal labor has suddenly become a matter of life and death. As she struggles to save both mother and baby, she doesn't know that two other women have already died under horrifying identical circumstances. And so begins Sarah's own nightmare, as she learns that the prenatal herbal vitamins she prescribed are the only thing these women have in common. Soon Sarah is fighting to save her career, her reputation--her life. For she's certain there must be some unknown factor linking these women, and as she gets closer to the truth, it becomes clear that someone will do anything--even murder--to keep a devastating secret.

My Thoughts:
Interesting to see the world of medicine through the eyes of Dr. Sarah Baldwin. She's the type of doctor that almost anyone would want to have. One that is not afraid to employee methods such as Western science medicine as well as using holistic practices such as acupuncture. But she gets into trouble when after two women die and one woman is maimed in their pregnancies after taking her herbal supplement which she recommended instead of the usual vitamins. An investigation follows which delves into politics and money.

The book started out as a whirlwind page turner that had so much promise....exciting passages that detailed medical emergencies as this bizarre blood clotting illness consumed its victims with horrific speed...realistic insights into internal hospital politics...and believe me there are many. Eventually it dissolved in the average hospital melodrama of big money...corporate greed...and institutionalized medicine versus the persecuted doctor. It seemed that Michael Palmer just couldn't figure a way to end it all on a different note than all the previous medical thrillers. ( )

Pretty good medical thriller. Fast paced and exciting albeit fairly predictable. I enjoyed it even if it wasn't the best thriller I've ever read. It was entertaining. ( )

Well after an unsupervised and undocumented journey from Sydney to Port Douglas, this book travelled in the comforts (albeit slightly crowded comforts but BC approved, see photo) of my backpack from Port Douglas north to Cooktown and then back down South to Rainbow Beach where it moved from the backpack to the handbag (a Ray White, non BC approved cloth tote) for reading on the Fraser trip and bus south to Brisbane, where it completed its duties on this fine spring day.

I liked the book, though I thought the ending was quite rushed and could have been better developed. I liked it well enough to want to find some of his other titles, though I can see them getting a bit samey after a while. I liked the Boston ties though, makes me almost homesick.

Thanks again for releasing this one, AG. I love your trick of putting a label midway through. Will take this to the mini meetup with Cackles and Jawin on Wednesday and if there is no interest, release it somewhere in Brisbane. ( )

This was an intense medical thriller with lots of twists and turns. Just when I thought I knew what caused the problems, Palmer deftly took the story in a new direction. ( )