Cure

June 28, 2010
Organized crime, international espionage, and kidnapping only mildly enliven Cook's methodical ninth medical thriller featuring husband-and-wife medical examiners Laurie Montgomery and Jack Stapleton (after Intervention). Laurie's first case back in the Manhattan medical examiner's office, after giving birth to the couple's firstborn, John "JJ" Junior, appears to be a routine case of death by natural causes. But Laurie suspects otherwise, and her dogged investigation uncovers a diabolical poisoning and a plot involving the Mafia and rival Japanese gangsters laundering money for a shady start-up firm promoting stem-cell research. To deter Laurie's prying, the thugs snatch JJ, and suddenly the intrigue gets very personal. Cook provides an interesting study of the strange bedfellows that the biotech business and the mob might make, but he telegraphs all his plot twists so far in advance that there's little suspense other than how quickly Laurie will tip to them. Even devoted Cook fans may find that the crimes and subterfuges are resolved too swiftly and perfunctorily.

June 1, 2010
Cooks latest thriller opens not with a microscopic medical event, as so many of his previous novels have, but with theft at a research lab in Kyoto, Japan. The perpetrator is Ben Corey, a doctor and the founder of a company designed to profit from stem cell research, and his crime is stealing away Satoshi Machita, one of Kyoto Universitys top researchers. But soon after he sneaks Satoshi and his family into the U.S., Satoshi disappearsthe target of an attack orchestrated by the Japanese yakuza and the American Mafia. Satoshis body turns up at the Office of the County Medical Examiner in New York City, where Laurie Montgomery, just returned from maternity leave, is assigned the case. Though theres no identification on the body and he appears to have died of natural causes, Laurie digs deeper, much to the consternation of the killers. When Laurie refuses to back off the case, the Mafia threatens the young son she shares with fellow ME Jack Stapleton. The dialogue is clunky and the mobsters dull, but readers invested in Cooks married ME duo will rapidly turn the pages as danger finds Laurie and Jack once again.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association.)