Sometimes People Die
A Novel
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3.8 • 25 Ratings
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
*A New York Times Editors' Choice Pick*
*The Sunday Times Crime Book of the Month*
*A CrimeReads Most Anticipated Book of Fall*
When too many patients die under his watch, a troubled young doctor suspects murder. But are his instincts to be trusted?
Returning to practice after a suspension for stealing opioids, a young doctor takes the only job he can find: a post as a physician at the struggling St. Luke's Hospital in east London. Amid the maelstrom of sick patients, overworked staff and underfunded wards, a more insidious secret soon declares itself: too many patients are dying. And a murderer may be lurking in plain sight.
Drawing on his experiences as a physician, Simon Stephenson takes readers into the dark heart of life as a hospitalist to ask the question: Who are the people we gift the power of life and death, and what does it do to them?
As beautifully written and witty as it is propulsive, Sometimes People Die is an unforgettable thriller that will haunt you long after you turn the last page.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
After opioid addiction costs the unnamed 29-year-old narrator of this enjoyable if uneven novel from Stephenson (Set My Heart to Five) his job in a Scottish hospital, he finds work at the desperate, understaffed St. Luke's in London, where he struggles to cope with the onslaught of poverty-stricken patients with "Victorian ailments" and "obscure exotic diseases." When an older patient dies unexpectedly, her barrister daughter's questions prompt a police investigation, which shows an alarming number of unexpected deaths at St. Luke's. The narrator, hauled in for questioning, worries that he's going to be arrested as suspicious deaths continue with no clear pattern of victim or method. When his roommate, an affable orthopedic surgeon, dies by suicide in the hospital parking lot, the narrator relapses. The police arrest a suspect, and the novel's tone shifts from dread to suspense as the narrator turns amateur sleuth when the facts don't seem to add up. Stephenson's sardonic wit and the farce of hapless, overconfident police work prop up the meandering, overlong plot. Most readers will wish the novel cut to the chase a bit more. Stephenson has done better.
Customer Reviews
Superb read
Incredibly well written page turner, couldn’t put it down, smart and addictive