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Peter Brown #1
Beat the Reaper
Dr. Peter Brown is an intern at Manhattan's worst hospital, with a talent for medicine, a shift from hell, and a past he'd prefer to keep hidden. Whether it's a blocked circumflex artery or a plan to land a massive malpractice suit, he knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.
Pietro "Bearclaw" Brnwna is a hitman for the mob, with a genius for violence, a well-earned fear of sharks, and an overly close relationship with the Federal Witness Relocation Program. More likely to leave a trail of dead gangsters than a molecule of evidence, he's the last person you want to see in your hospital room.
Nicholas LoBrutto, aka Eddy Squillante, is Dr. Brown's new patient, with three months to live and a very strange idea: that Peter Brown and Pietro Brnwa might-just might-be the same person ...
Now, with the mob, the government, and death itself descending on the hospital, Peter has to buy time and do whatever it takes to keep his patients, himself, and his last shot at redemption alive. To get through the next eight hours-and somehow beat the reaper.
Spattered in adrenaline-fueled action and bone-saw-sharp dialogue, BEAT THE REAPER is a debut thriller so utterly original you won't be able to guess what happens next, and so shockingly entertaining you won't be able to put it down.
Pietro "Bearclaw" Brnwna is a hitman for the mob, with a genius for violence, a well-earned fear of sharks, and an overly close relationship with the Federal Witness Relocation Program. More likely to leave a trail of dead gangsters than a molecule of evidence, he's the last person you want to see in your hospital room.
Nicholas LoBrutto, aka Eddy Squillante, is Dr. Brown's new patient, with three months to live and a very strange idea: that Peter Brown and Pietro Brnwa might-just might-be the same person ...
Now, with the mob, the government, and death itself descending on the hospital, Peter has to buy time and do whatever it takes to keep his patients, himself, and his last shot at redemption alive. To get through the next eight hours-and somehow beat the reaper.
Spattered in adrenaline-fueled action and bone-saw-sharp dialogue, BEAT THE REAPER is a debut thriller so utterly original you won't be able to guess what happens next, and so shockingly entertaining you won't be able to put it down.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published January 7, 2009
363 people are currently reading
7547 people want to read
About the author
Josh Bazell
15 books457 followersJosh Bazell has a BA in writing from Brown University and a MD from Columbia University. He is currently a medical resident at the University of California, San Francisco, and is working on his second novel. He wrote "Beat the Reaper" during the end of medical school and the beginning of residency. Some of his favorite writers are James Ellroy, Ken Bruen, Michael Connelly and Peter Lovesey. He states that he got the idea for this novel when going through medical school training and observed the tension physicians feel between doing medicine and their life outside of medicine. So he wanted to write about a doctor who was also the opposite of a doctor.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,614 reviews
September 8, 2021
(B) 72% | More than Satisfactory
Notes: Falling apart at the end, it climaxes its penultimate chapter in the most uncomfortable reading moment I've ever had.
Notes: Falling apart at the end, it climaxes its penultimate chapter in the most uncomfortable reading moment I've ever had.
March 6, 2009
Utterly ridiculous, gratuitously violent, highly improbable, totally engrossing, lightening-paced. Why don't more people write like this?
May 14, 2011
Anybody who thinks the U.S. doesn't need health care reform should read this book. Since the author was a medical intern and the details about patient care seem horribly realistic, I think I'd rather read a Surgery For Dummies book and attempt my own future operations with a bottle of Jack Daniels, a carpet knife, duct tape and some rusty pliers rather than risk being admitted to a hospital after reading this.
Peter Brown is a harried resident trying to get through another miserable day at a large hospital and keep his med students from killing too many patients. But he's also a former mob hitman in witness protection trying to start a new life as a doctor. When one of his old collegues shows up as a patient and recognizes him, Brown spends the day juggling his medical duties while trying to keep his old pals from finding out where he is.
This was a darkly funny and fast paced story with an original and outlandish premise. The author's medical background makes for some gross and scary details about the kind of medical things they never talk about on ER or House. The story of Peter frantically trying to keep the mob patient from blabbing about his whereabouts while dealing with a stream of medical problems is intercut with flashbacks to the background of how Peter became a hitman and why he turned on the mob and entered witness protection.
I loved this book until the ending. Everything was clicking right along, but it's as if Bazell just decided that it was time to end the whole thing and he just threw on the brakes and wrapped everything up in just a few pages. It was pretty jarring and I wish he would have spent some time on the resolution, but this was still a great (but gruesome) crime novel with a medical twist.
Peter Brown is a harried resident trying to get through another miserable day at a large hospital and keep his med students from killing too many patients. But he's also a former mob hitman in witness protection trying to start a new life as a doctor. When one of his old collegues shows up as a patient and recognizes him, Brown spends the day juggling his medical duties while trying to keep his old pals from finding out where he is.
This was a darkly funny and fast paced story with an original and outlandish premise. The author's medical background makes for some gross and scary details about the kind of medical things they never talk about on ER or House. The story of Peter frantically trying to keep the mob patient from blabbing about his whereabouts while dealing with a stream of medical problems is intercut with flashbacks to the background of how Peter became a hitman and why he turned on the mob and entered witness protection.
I loved this book until the ending. Everything was clicking right along, but it's as if Bazell just decided that it was time to end the whole thing and he just threw on the brakes and wrapped everything up in just a few pages. It was pretty jarring and I wish he would have spent some time on the resolution, but this was still a great (but gruesome) crime novel with a medical twist.
August 17, 2013
Hey fuckhead,
Yep, you, the one with the track marks running down both arms trying to slide off into oblivion, with the tilted head and the faraway expression, staring at the sun like it’s some four-headed monster ready to steal your dreams, twitching for your next fix like some random dog left out in the rain too long, with a stutter-stepping walk and attitude, veering off from the rest of the universe like a bad dream; you might want to sit this one out, otherwise you might have more than just a fogged-up brain on your hands. You may want to study a medical chart and have your CT scanned and actually study ligaments and tendons and muscles and bones and maybe even pass an anatomy class, although that might be too much to ask, because you’re about to get your ass kicked, and you’ll need to be able to piece yourself back together later, with the doctor’s help of course. And frankly that’s what you’re going to need: loads and loads of help.
The medical industry is encased in a shitstorm the likes of which your coke-snorting ass has never seen, and it’s about to get worse for you and your fellow fuckhead Americans. And if you can stop being a worthless piece of horseshit for more than one fucking minute, you might actually have a prayer at making it in this world, instead of ending up in some premature, unmarked grave all by your lonesome staring at the bottom of a coffin at the age of twenty-two with your eyes wide open.
The good news is you’ll die of lethal injection, probably at the hands of some no-name doctor, when all you did was go and see the man about a head cold. So at least you’ll have that going for you. Because if I really wanted to kill you, I could shove a cork down your throat or jack you full of potassium until your eyes bleed, or I could have one of the Latvian nurses on my floor, who is really nothing more than a worthless piece of shit, who smokes more weed than she does rounds and surfs the Internet like she has a gun held to her head, ignore your ass for the rest of your miserable life, peppering your chart with the standard healthy readings when really you’re secretly dying of stomach cancer.
And don’t forget that I’ve worked for the mob, hell they brought me into their family, not the one where I had to prove that I’m worthy by killing some innocent individual while he was sleeping, or watching TV in the middle of the afternoon, but the one where I was sitting around the dining room table on a Sunday afternoon shooting the shit. I spent my formative years in dojos studying everything from tae kwon do to kempo, so I know over 100 ways to make your ears bleed, so if you don’t get yourself straight and step the fuck off, I’ll plant your ass at the bottom of a cesspool, and I’ll work the next 120 hours without even batting an eyelash.
Yep, I might just be the craziest son of a bitch you ever met. I pop Moxfane tablets like they’re caffeine pills; I take powernaps in a coat closet; and I’ll smear a pint of blood all over myself for the right cause. I have what you might call a rapid-onset addiction to bloodshed, and I killed four men while I was still taped to a chair along with countless other fuckers that I’d rather not mention since I’m in WITSEC, so I really have no qualms about killing an innocent, or in your case, not-so-innocent individual.
And while you may not think you’re a dumbfuck, and that you’re actually being clever by trying to jump my ass while I’m wearing scrubs, there are at least forty different kinds of stupidity, and over the course of our less than five-minute interlude, you exhibited every single one of them, and probably about a dozen others that haven’t even been medically diagnosed yet. So, yep, you’re fucked, and that’s even without your latest fix.
Oh, and whatever you do, don’t go to Sicily. Trust me, you’ll thank me later.
Sincerely,
Dr. Pietro Brnwa (Bearclaw), intern
P.S. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get some Mexican hairless beaver before you die.
P.P.S. Don’t be such a fuckhead, fuckhead.
DISCLAIMER - I really liked this book and this voice, so much in fact that I couldn't write this review any other way.
Cross-posted at Robert's Reads
Yep, you, the one with the track marks running down both arms trying to slide off into oblivion, with the tilted head and the faraway expression, staring at the sun like it’s some four-headed monster ready to steal your dreams, twitching for your next fix like some random dog left out in the rain too long, with a stutter-stepping walk and attitude, veering off from the rest of the universe like a bad dream; you might want to sit this one out, otherwise you might have more than just a fogged-up brain on your hands. You may want to study a medical chart and have your CT scanned and actually study ligaments and tendons and muscles and bones and maybe even pass an anatomy class, although that might be too much to ask, because you’re about to get your ass kicked, and you’ll need to be able to piece yourself back together later, with the doctor’s help of course. And frankly that’s what you’re going to need: loads and loads of help.
The medical industry is encased in a shitstorm the likes of which your coke-snorting ass has never seen, and it’s about to get worse for you and your fellow fuckhead Americans. And if you can stop being a worthless piece of horseshit for more than one fucking minute, you might actually have a prayer at making it in this world, instead of ending up in some premature, unmarked grave all by your lonesome staring at the bottom of a coffin at the age of twenty-two with your eyes wide open.
The good news is you’ll die of lethal injection, probably at the hands of some no-name doctor, when all you did was go and see the man about a head cold. So at least you’ll have that going for you. Because if I really wanted to kill you, I could shove a cork down your throat or jack you full of potassium until your eyes bleed, or I could have one of the Latvian nurses on my floor, who is really nothing more than a worthless piece of shit, who smokes more weed than she does rounds and surfs the Internet like she has a gun held to her head, ignore your ass for the rest of your miserable life, peppering your chart with the standard healthy readings when really you’re secretly dying of stomach cancer.
And don’t forget that I’ve worked for the mob, hell they brought me into their family, not the one where I had to prove that I’m worthy by killing some innocent individual while he was sleeping, or watching TV in the middle of the afternoon, but the one where I was sitting around the dining room table on a Sunday afternoon shooting the shit. I spent my formative years in dojos studying everything from tae kwon do to kempo, so I know over 100 ways to make your ears bleed, so if you don’t get yourself straight and step the fuck off, I’ll plant your ass at the bottom of a cesspool, and I’ll work the next 120 hours without even batting an eyelash.
Yep, I might just be the craziest son of a bitch you ever met. I pop Moxfane tablets like they’re caffeine pills; I take powernaps in a coat closet; and I’ll smear a pint of blood all over myself for the right cause. I have what you might call a rapid-onset addiction to bloodshed, and I killed four men while I was still taped to a chair along with countless other fuckers that I’d rather not mention since I’m in WITSEC, so I really have no qualms about killing an innocent, or in your case, not-so-innocent individual.
And while you may not think you’re a dumbfuck, and that you’re actually being clever by trying to jump my ass while I’m wearing scrubs, there are at least forty different kinds of stupidity, and over the course of our less than five-minute interlude, you exhibited every single one of them, and probably about a dozen others that haven’t even been medically diagnosed yet. So, yep, you’re fucked, and that’s even without your latest fix.
Oh, and whatever you do, don’t go to Sicily. Trust me, you’ll thank me later.
Sincerely,
Dr. Pietro Brnwa (Bearclaw), intern
P.S. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get some Mexican hairless beaver before you die.
P.P.S. Don’t be such a fuckhead, fuckhead.
DISCLAIMER - I really liked this book and this voice, so much in fact that I couldn't write this review any other way.
Cross-posted at Robert's Reads
June 30, 2013
An outrageous novel that got me laughing a lot in between painfully gruesome situations, a plot worthy of comic books, and occasional absurdly implausible sex scenes.
A young intern of Polish Jewish background, Peter Brown, tries to save patients from gross incompetence at the “worst hospital in Manhattan” while popping drugs to keep awake. It turns out he is former mob hit man in Witness Protection, and his cover is in danger of being blown. Much of the tale corresponds to reflecting back on his unusual past that led to his current situation. His parents were murdered when he was a kid, and he works his way toward avenging their death in his teenage years. This attracts the attention of the mobster father of his school friend, who leads him take on work carrying out periodic hits for money on despicable people that truly deserve killing.
His brutal defense against a mugger on the way to work on the first pages reveals his special skills in violence and sardonic internal dialog that typically leans to medical annotation in excruciating detail. Because of my background in the medical sciences, I liked the collision of unrealistic plot violence with realistic coverage of consequences. To help you decide if this novel is for you, I share with you this piece from the opening scenario:
…the fuckhead can see the blue scrub pants under my overcoat…, so he thinks I’ve got drugs and money on me. And maybe that I’ve taken some kind of oath not to kick his fuckhead ass for trying to mug me.
I barely have enough drugs and money to get me through the day. And the only oath I took, as I recall, was to first do no harm. I’m thinking we’re past that point. …
I turn around, which rolls the gun off my skull and leaves my raised right hand above the fuckhead’s arm. I wrap his elbow and jerk upward, causing the ligaments to pop like champagne corks.
Let’s take a moment to smell the rose known as the elbow.
The two bones of the forearm, the ulna and the radius, move independently of each other, and also rotate. You can see this by turning your hand from palm up, in which position the ulna and radius are parallel, to palm down, where they’re crossed into an “X.” They therefore require a complicated anchoring system at the elbow, with the ligaments wrapping the various bone ends in spoolable and unspoolable ribbons that look like the tape on the handle of a tennis racket. It’s a shame to tear these ligaments apart.
Thus, you can see that the book is not for the squeamish, but as with me Bazell’s imaginative over-the-top action and particular genius for humor in his delivery may appeal enough to get you past the tough parts.
A young intern of Polish Jewish background, Peter Brown, tries to save patients from gross incompetence at the “worst hospital in Manhattan” while popping drugs to keep awake. It turns out he is former mob hit man in Witness Protection, and his cover is in danger of being blown. Much of the tale corresponds to reflecting back on his unusual past that led to his current situation. His parents were murdered when he was a kid, and he works his way toward avenging their death in his teenage years. This attracts the attention of the mobster father of his school friend, who leads him take on work carrying out periodic hits for money on despicable people that truly deserve killing.
His brutal defense against a mugger on the way to work on the first pages reveals his special skills in violence and sardonic internal dialog that typically leans to medical annotation in excruciating detail. Because of my background in the medical sciences, I liked the collision of unrealistic plot violence with realistic coverage of consequences. To help you decide if this novel is for you, I share with you this piece from the opening scenario:
…the fuckhead can see the blue scrub pants under my overcoat…, so he thinks I’ve got drugs and money on me. And maybe that I’ve taken some kind of oath not to kick his fuckhead ass for trying to mug me.
I barely have enough drugs and money to get me through the day. And the only oath I took, as I recall, was to first do no harm. I’m thinking we’re past that point. …
I turn around, which rolls the gun off my skull and leaves my raised right hand above the fuckhead’s arm. I wrap his elbow and jerk upward, causing the ligaments to pop like champagne corks.
Let’s take a moment to smell the rose known as the elbow.
The two bones of the forearm, the ulna and the radius, move independently of each other, and also rotate. You can see this by turning your hand from palm up, in which position the ulna and radius are parallel, to palm down, where they’re crossed into an “X.” They therefore require a complicated anchoring system at the elbow, with the ligaments wrapping the various bone ends in spoolable and unspoolable ribbons that look like the tape on the handle of a tennis racket. It’s a shame to tear these ligaments apart.
Thus, you can see that the book is not for the squeamish, but as with me Bazell’s imaginative over-the-top action and particular genius for humor in his delivery may appeal enough to get you past the tough parts.
April 25, 2019
A very interesting and disturbing novel that’s excessive on violence, especially toward some good and undeserving characters. This would have rated higher with fewer innocents killed. 7 of 10 stars
April 23, 2011
When I started reading this, I had the vague expectation that it was going to be some sort of urban fantasy.
It wasn't. But that didn't keep me absolutely loving it.
It's funny, clever, fast-moving, irreverent, and horrifying in turns. I highly recommend it. Unless you're a hypochondriac. If you are, you should avoid it like the plague. (heh.)
It wasn't. But that didn't keep me absolutely loving it.
It's funny, clever, fast-moving, irreverent, and horrifying in turns. I highly recommend it. Unless you're a hypochondriac. If you are, you should avoid it like the plague. (heh.)
May 13, 2011
I’m a Charlie Huston honk. There, I admitted it. Like the first step out of twelve, I recognize my problem. And I feel unburdened. Free almost. I’m a Huston-holic. A junkie for Charlie’s magical mushroom prose. And like every good Huston-holic, I’m always searching for writers with a similar style. Writers that’ll grab me by the throat, worrying me like a dog.
Enter Josh Bazell.
A combination of Huston and Chuck Palahniuk, Bazell stuns with his debut novel Beat the Reaper, a brutal and humorous medical-crime gritfest. It’s Goodfellas meets House—with footnotes. Part hitman, part healer. But with a bedside manner that will have you running out of a hospital quicker than you can say “HMO.” Though this big idea sounds odd, the novel works, beautifully. Like a virus that gets inside you, always consuming, always growing. Never stopping. If you don’t have an addiction, Beat the Reaper will give you one. Namely a finishing-the-book addiction. It’s like life. Once you start, you won’t stop until you reach the end.
Dr. Peter Brown has a past he’d like to forget. Once a hitter for the mob—known as Pietro “Bearclaw” Brnwa—he got out when things went bad, testifying against his former employers before dropping off the face of the earth, courtesy of the Federal Witness Protection Program.
Relocated and re-imagined, Peter assumes a new life as an intern at Manhattan Catholic Hospital. Helping and treating patients. Including one patient who happens to be a mob father with a good memory. One who happens to recognize the Pietro in Peter. Suddenly Peter must move fast to stay ahead of a vengeful mob looking to mete out mafia justice. The type of justice that’ll put him into the Manhattan Catholic morgue.
The narrative alternates between chapters. One plotline focusing on Peter’s current predicament and one examining his past as a mob enforcer, both slowly teasing out the answers of why he left the life. And why he’s on the lam. The action is intense, and the alternating nature of the chapters makes the book incredibly addictive. Like literary crack, it’ll have you greeting the dawn, puffy red bags under your eyes. I stayed up most of the night, compelled to finish. Even better I was absolutely satisfied once I did.
Bazell never shortchanges the reader, peppering Beat the Reaper with a slew of unforgettable moments, leading to an ending so grotesque and badass you won’t want to miss it. And you’ll probably never be the same after you’ve read it.
Like Huston, Bazell creates dialogue with a street cadence. It sounds real, and even more importantly, it sounds cool. Really cool. Like you can use it to impress your friends. Make them think you’re clever. Coupled with the odd-fact weirdness popularized by Palahniuk, and Beat the Reaper makes for a unique and humorous read. The mob and medicine have never been this engaging together.
Last Word:
Stunning debuts like Beat the Reaper do one thing—leave you wanting more. Like a kid stomping his foot, impatiently. More Pietro Brwna, more streetwise dialogue, more intense, heart-stopping action. More Josh Bazell. After this gem, people will be eagerly anticipating Bazell’s next novel. I know—I’m one of them. And that’s the first step, admitting the problem. Admitting you’re a Bazell-holic.
Enter Josh Bazell.
A combination of Huston and Chuck Palahniuk, Bazell stuns with his debut novel Beat the Reaper, a brutal and humorous medical-crime gritfest. It’s Goodfellas meets House—with footnotes. Part hitman, part healer. But with a bedside manner that will have you running out of a hospital quicker than you can say “HMO.” Though this big idea sounds odd, the novel works, beautifully. Like a virus that gets inside you, always consuming, always growing. Never stopping. If you don’t have an addiction, Beat the Reaper will give you one. Namely a finishing-the-book addiction. It’s like life. Once you start, you won’t stop until you reach the end.
Dr. Peter Brown has a past he’d like to forget. Once a hitter for the mob—known as Pietro “Bearclaw” Brnwa—he got out when things went bad, testifying against his former employers before dropping off the face of the earth, courtesy of the Federal Witness Protection Program.
Relocated and re-imagined, Peter assumes a new life as an intern at Manhattan Catholic Hospital. Helping and treating patients. Including one patient who happens to be a mob father with a good memory. One who happens to recognize the Pietro in Peter. Suddenly Peter must move fast to stay ahead of a vengeful mob looking to mete out mafia justice. The type of justice that’ll put him into the Manhattan Catholic morgue.
The narrative alternates between chapters. One plotline focusing on Peter’s current predicament and one examining his past as a mob enforcer, both slowly teasing out the answers of why he left the life. And why he’s on the lam. The action is intense, and the alternating nature of the chapters makes the book incredibly addictive. Like literary crack, it’ll have you greeting the dawn, puffy red bags under your eyes. I stayed up most of the night, compelled to finish. Even better I was absolutely satisfied once I did.
Bazell never shortchanges the reader, peppering Beat the Reaper with a slew of unforgettable moments, leading to an ending so grotesque and badass you won’t want to miss it. And you’ll probably never be the same after you’ve read it.
Like Huston, Bazell creates dialogue with a street cadence. It sounds real, and even more importantly, it sounds cool. Really cool. Like you can use it to impress your friends. Make them think you’re clever. Coupled with the odd-fact weirdness popularized by Palahniuk, and Beat the Reaper makes for a unique and humorous read. The mob and medicine have never been this engaging together.
Last Word:
Stunning debuts like Beat the Reaper do one thing—leave you wanting more. Like a kid stomping his foot, impatiently. More Pietro Brwna, more streetwise dialogue, more intense, heart-stopping action. More Josh Bazell. After this gem, people will be eagerly anticipating Bazell’s next novel. I know—I’m one of them. And that’s the first step, admitting the problem. Admitting you’re a Bazell-holic.
October 3, 2023
সারাজীবন শুনে এসেছি পাগলামীর লিমিট থাকে, যাক লেখক আর অনুবাদক (রূপান্তর) এর কল্যানে বুঝলাম পাগলামীর কোনো লিমিট নেই।
আমার কাছে দারুন এন্টারটেইনিং ছিল পুরো বইটাই , যদিও শেষের অংশ খুবই আনকম্ফর্টেবল ছিল !
তবে সামিউল রুমী ভাই রূপান্তরে দারুন মুন্সিয়ানা দেখিয়েছেন। জানিনা অর্জিনাল বইটা পড়লে এত ইঞ্জয় করতাম কিনা !
বলতেই হবে দারুন কিছু মুহূর্ত কেটেছে বইটার সাথে !
আমার কাছে দারুন এন্টারটেইনিং ছিল পুরো বইটাই , যদিও শেষের অংশ খুবই আনকম্ফর্টেবল ছিল !
তবে সামিউল রুমী ভাই রূপান্তরে দারুন মুন্সিয়ানা দেখিয়েছেন। জানিনা অর্জিনাল বইটা পড়লে এত ইঞ্জয় করতাম কিনা !
বলতেই হবে দারুন কিছু মুহূর্ত কেটেছে বইটার সাথে !
May 14, 2011
This is one of the most unique and entertaining novels I've read in a long time. At the age of fourteen, Pietro Brwna is orphaned for a second time when someone murders the grandparents who had raised him for much of his life. In school, Pietro befriends the son of a mob lawyer, Davide Locano, and the Locanos become his new surrogate family. But Pietro is determined to hunt down and kill the cretins who murdered his grandparents. With Locano's assistance, he identifies the killers and dispatches them.
It's apparent that Pietro has a talent for this sort of thing and he ultimately becomes a mob hitman. When complications ensue, as they often do in the hitman business, Pietro bails out and enters the witness protection program. Several years later, Dr. Peter Brown is an intern at a New York hospital when a new patient recognizes him as Pietro and alerts the mob. Now Dr. Brown must deal with several medical emergencies while the mobsters converge on the hospital, anxious to make Dr. Brown himself a terminal case.
This is at once a hilarious and gut-wrenching story. Josh Bazell has a wicked sense of humor and, as an M.D. himself, he writes a tale in which the misadventures that occur in the hospital are perhaps even more hair-raising than the criminal activity that takes place outside of it. Peter Brown is an inspired character, unlike anyone you've ever met in a novel before, and he narrates a gripping story with a climax that has to be read to be believed. Finishing the book, though, I came away with the feeling that I'd rather take my chances against mob hitmen hunting for me as opposed to going into a hospital for even a minor proceedure.
It's apparent that Pietro has a talent for this sort of thing and he ultimately becomes a mob hitman. When complications ensue, as they often do in the hitman business, Pietro bails out and enters the witness protection program. Several years later, Dr. Peter Brown is an intern at a New York hospital when a new patient recognizes him as Pietro and alerts the mob. Now Dr. Brown must deal with several medical emergencies while the mobsters converge on the hospital, anxious to make Dr. Brown himself a terminal case.
This is at once a hilarious and gut-wrenching story. Josh Bazell has a wicked sense of humor and, as an M.D. himself, he writes a tale in which the misadventures that occur in the hospital are perhaps even more hair-raising than the criminal activity that takes place outside of it. Peter Brown is an inspired character, unlike anyone you've ever met in a novel before, and he narrates a gripping story with a climax that has to be read to be believed. Finishing the book, though, I came away with the feeling that I'd rather take my chances against mob hitmen hunting for me as opposed to going into a hospital for even a minor proceedure.
December 12, 2017
3.5 stars for the Audible version.
Well, now. I'm not even really sure what I just finished listening to! Beat the Reaper was fast-paced, gritty, edgy, and funny. It also, at times, seemed to try too hard to be shocking. This is not a book for prudes nor for the squeamish.
It took me a bit to get into the rhythm of chapters that alternated between telling past events and those happening *right now*, but overall I enjoyed this book, and I think narrator Robert Petkoff was a perfect choice -- I'll definitely be looking for more of his work! Unfortunately, I found the music and sound effects, which seemed to have been added almost randomly, to be distracting. It's a shame, too, because the echoing voice effect was perfect when it was used, but other effects were less subtle, and every time the music started up it pulled me right out of the story.
I might consider giving the sequel a go despite its less than stellar reviews, but I won't be rushing out to get it.
Well, now. I'm not even really sure what I just finished listening to! Beat the Reaper was fast-paced, gritty, edgy, and funny. It also, at times, seemed to try too hard to be shocking. This is not a book for prudes nor for the squeamish.
It took me a bit to get into the rhythm of chapters that alternated between telling past events and those happening *right now*, but overall I enjoyed this book, and I think narrator Robert Petkoff was a perfect choice -- I'll definitely be looking for more of his work! Unfortunately, I found the music and sound effects, which seemed to have been added almost randomly, to be distracting. It's a shame, too, because the echoing voice effect was perfect when it was used, but other effects were less subtle, and every time the music started up it pulled me right out of the story.
I might consider giving the sequel a go despite its less than stellar reviews, but I won't be rushing out to get it.
February 6, 2013
I finally received a copy of this book 5 weeks after the Pulp Fiction group chose it as their monthly read. Go AusPost! But it was an ugly copy that felt like it had been photocopied, including a glossy print for the flimsy cover. Must do better work at publishing actual books people.
About two thirds of the way through my interest was waning and I decided to check out the 1 Star reviews to see if others were having the same problem I was having with it - the flashbacks were slow and largely uninteresting. And to my sheer horror I found myself compiling a list of some of the stupidly idiotic things that other readers said in a disparaging way about this book. Why do I torture myself this way?
This book is filled with swearing, duh, it's about a former Mafia hitman in the witness protection program working as a doctor in a hospital.
If you expected this to be a 1940s Hollywood movie think again, if you're easily offended by the term fuckhead thrown around as casually as a sports jacket in a 5 star restaurant then perhaps the first paragraph should have been enough to warn you off. Don't come around here complaining and dragging a books rating down with your social morals from a time long lost to the primordial soup.
This book is filled with gory descriptions of medical procedures, duh, it's about a former Mafia hitman in the witness protection program working as a doctor in a hospital.
If you expected some kind of daytime soap opera drama think again, I consider myself tough and there were a few moments (especially the denouement) where I lost it, if the thought of a skinned knee without your mother coming to kiss it better makes you want to cry or vomit I suggest you steer clear of a book that unashamedly features an autofibulectomy. Don't come around here crying about how crude and apathetic the portrayal of the broken US healthcare system is when this book was written by a practising medical resident at the University of California. I suggest you question your own perceptions of your broken healthcare system before criticising a novel.
This book features sexual encounters, unlikable characters and a zany/unbelievable plot, duh, it's about a former Mafia hitman in the witness protection program working as a doctor in a hospital.
I'm not joking here, read the synopsis, done it? Good, does that sound remotely normal? No! If you were expecting The Sopranos mixed with ER you're barking up the wrong tree. This really is a book that takes every absurd thing the author has witnessed or heard about as a doctor in a hospital and puts it in to a story that takes place over the course of one day, it's closer to Scrubs multiplied in absurdity by a thousand than it is to ER. This is no Robin Cook medical thriller either folks.
There's a quote on the back from Don Winslow himself about how cool and ferocious this book is and at times it felt like Bazell was heavily influenced by the guy but didn't quite make it, with the lack of substance to his story and characters. It's like Don Winslow light, much funnier, relentless in it's pace (aside from the middle section of flashbacks), but with an arrogant, unlikable, confused, boy as the protagonist.
One reviewer even suggested improving your life by reading a novel about a protagonist "sincerely religious, gentle, and moral, i.e., resembling at least some people the real world.[sic]" Which I found extremely naive on several levels.
But I'm not going to criticise them for believing there aren't people in the world who behave like the characters in this book (there are, we know there are, infact it's quite likely that we share many characteristics with Josh Bazell's characters) or for picking up a book about a mafia hitman in the witness protection program; it's the idea that for a story to have a moral and to work as an entertaining narrative the protagonist needs to be likable, not even holier than thou perfect (how dull would that be,) just plain likable. You don't need to like Peter Brown to know that he is a man doing the best that he can, to realise that all of his actions (and especially the denouement) are attempts at self-flagellation and redemption for his past sins.
Actually, perhaps there aren't many people in the world who are like that?
That's not even where it falls down, it's the slow and largely uninteresting flashbacks that take up nearly half of the novel, if that had been improved I would happily have thrown this an extra star.
I'm intrigued by the concept of a sequel (it's getting worse reviews) simply because surely there's no back story to plump up the page count.
Do yourself a favour, at least read a surgical manual before attempting to recreate some of the scenes from this book in your own home. Failing that, trial the procedure on some unsuspecting homeless guy first.
About two thirds of the way through my interest was waning and I decided to check out the 1 Star reviews to see if others were having the same problem I was having with it - the flashbacks were slow and largely uninteresting. And to my sheer horror I found myself compiling a list of some of the stupidly idiotic things that other readers said in a disparaging way about this book. Why do I torture myself this way?
This book is filled with swearing, duh, it's about a former Mafia hitman in the witness protection program working as a doctor in a hospital.
If you expected this to be a 1940s Hollywood movie think again, if you're easily offended by the term fuckhead thrown around as casually as a sports jacket in a 5 star restaurant then perhaps the first paragraph should have been enough to warn you off. Don't come around here complaining and dragging a books rating down with your social morals from a time long lost to the primordial soup.
This book is filled with gory descriptions of medical procedures, duh, it's about a former Mafia hitman in the witness protection program working as a doctor in a hospital.
If you expected some kind of daytime soap opera drama think again, I consider myself tough and there were a few moments (especially the denouement) where I lost it, if the thought of a skinned knee without your mother coming to kiss it better makes you want to cry or vomit I suggest you steer clear of a book that unashamedly features an autofibulectomy. Don't come around here crying about how crude and apathetic the portrayal of the broken US healthcare system is when this book was written by a practising medical resident at the University of California. I suggest you question your own perceptions of your broken healthcare system before criticising a novel.
This book features sexual encounters, unlikable characters and a zany/unbelievable plot, duh, it's about a former Mafia hitman in the witness protection program working as a doctor in a hospital.
I'm not joking here, read the synopsis, done it? Good, does that sound remotely normal? No! If you were expecting The Sopranos mixed with ER you're barking up the wrong tree. This really is a book that takes every absurd thing the author has witnessed or heard about as a doctor in a hospital and puts it in to a story that takes place over the course of one day, it's closer to Scrubs multiplied in absurdity by a thousand than it is to ER. This is no Robin Cook medical thriller either folks.
There's a quote on the back from Don Winslow himself about how cool and ferocious this book is and at times it felt like Bazell was heavily influenced by the guy but didn't quite make it, with the lack of substance to his story and characters. It's like Don Winslow light, much funnier, relentless in it's pace (aside from the middle section of flashbacks), but with an arrogant, unlikable, confused, boy as the protagonist.
One reviewer even suggested improving your life by reading a novel about a protagonist "sincerely religious, gentle, and moral, i.e., resembling at least some people the real world.[sic]" Which I found extremely naive on several levels.
But I'm not going to criticise them for believing there aren't people in the world who behave like the characters in this book (there are, we know there are, infact it's quite likely that we share many characteristics with Josh Bazell's characters) or for picking up a book about a mafia hitman in the witness protection program; it's the idea that for a story to have a moral and to work as an entertaining narrative the protagonist needs to be likable, not even holier than thou perfect (how dull would that be,) just plain likable. You don't need to like Peter Brown to know that he is a man doing the best that he can, to realise that all of his actions (and especially the denouement) are attempts at self-flagellation and redemption for his past sins.
Actually, perhaps there aren't many people in the world who are like that?
That's not even where it falls down, it's the slow and largely uninteresting flashbacks that take up nearly half of the novel, if that had been improved I would happily have thrown this an extra star.
I'm intrigued by the concept of a sequel (it's getting worse reviews) simply because surely there's no back story to plump up the page count.
Do yourself a favour, at least read a surgical manual before attempting to recreate some of the scenes from this book in your own home. Failing that, trial the procedure on some unsuspecting homeless guy first.
August 12, 2009
3 ½ stars (Note: Posting again since apparently not received via e-mail updates.)
A while ago I mentioned in a review-commentary that I was due for some light reading, some brain candy. After some back-and-forth discussion, Beat the Reaper won out over a couple of other suggestions. As it turns out, it’s not a book I would ordinarily pick up, and if I had, after skimming the first few pages, I might have put it down once I saw that this author was hell-bent on inserting a lot of profanity and violent behavior in his narrative. But I persevered because I respect the opinion of the Goodreads friend who recommended it.
The book opens at 5:00 a.m. with Dr. Peter Brown watching a pigeon fight a rat in the snow when a mugger sticks a gun into the base of his skull. It’s cold, and it actually feels sort of good, in an acupressure kind of way. (I liked that line; will be sharing with my physiotherapist next week.) The mugger recognizes him as a doctor by his blue scrub pants, and must assume not only that the doc will do no harm, but that he must be carrying drugs and money. I barely have enough drugs and money to get me through the day. And the only oath I took, as I recall, was to first do no harm. I’m thinking we’re past that point…. I wrap his elbow and jerk upwards, causing ligaments to pop like champagne corks. Let’s take a moment to smell the rose known as the elbow. And during a medical explanation about the mechanics of what the protagonist just did, Josh Bazell takes the reader to his first footnote, and then ends the paragraph with: It’s a shame to tear these ligaments apart. But the good doctor isn’t exactly remorseful, and by the time the scene ends, we’ve read through a considerable dose of coarse language during the course of a vicious attack.
Turns out pill-popping Dr. Brown is the same person as Pietro "Bearclaw" Brnwa, ex-hit-man, whose story is told in third person past-tense. First-person narrator and present-day Peter is in a Witness Protection Program. When Peter returns to the hospital, he is recognized by a mobster who has cancer. It’s either his life or Peter’s; past and present meet up. The present-day lasts 8 hours, during which time Peter must Beat the Reaper. Flashbacks are used to show Pietro’s life with the grandparents who raised him, and to them being killed when Pietro is not quite fifteen years old. Pietro, now working for the Mafia, justifies killing: he is avenging the murder of his grandparents. As a doctor, Peter is supposedly atoning for his previous “life”, but as the opening scene shows us, he’s not totally over it.
Weaving back and forth in time, scene breaks show tiny graphics of the Reaper chasing him on foot. When he falls in love (“at-first-sight”) the graphics change to the Reaper on a tractor:
Plutarch says carrying new wives across thresholds is stupid because we don’t remember that it refers to the rape of the Sabine women – and that’s f-ing Plutarch, two thousand years ago. We still draw the Reaper with a scythe. We should draw him driving a John Deere for Archer Daniels Midland.
The book is littered with these little scene breaks as well as footnotes. Sometimes the footnotes are informative; sometimes the author is just checking to see that you’re awake, if you’re paying attention; or simply, *Like you care what this means. The narrative also continues to be riddled with profanity; brutal acts; scenes that are grisly enough to make one wince; and others that make it difficult to suspend belief. One sex scene was particularly improbable. One minute I’m rolling my eyes, and the next, actually laughing out loud.
It is action-packed, but I found the book easy to put down. Nor is it great literature. Here are a few of the more noteworthy lines:
- But the hounds don’t shun the fox for being mangy. The mob theory was all I had to go on, so I chased it.
- Ah, youth. It’s like heroin you’ve smoked instead of snorted. Gone so fast you can’t believe you still have to pay for it.
- It worried me. Skinflick was as immune to shame as anyone I knew, but even he had his limits. And the journey from shame to resentment is the shortest one there is.
Of course, Bazell is not pretending to offer good literature. Rather, what he gives the reader is a well-plotted story strewn throughout with bizarre ideas; that a one-legged girl might find a dance partner “down at the hop” is the kind of macabre humour we hear through Dr. Brown.
So, if you enjoy this sort of madcap action/thriller type of book, pick it up. As for me, I thought brain candy was something light and fluffy; cotton-candy for the mind. With Beat the Reaper I felt like I got black licorice.
A while ago I mentioned in a review-commentary that I was due for some light reading, some brain candy. After some back-and-forth discussion, Beat the Reaper won out over a couple of other suggestions. As it turns out, it’s not a book I would ordinarily pick up, and if I had, after skimming the first few pages, I might have put it down once I saw that this author was hell-bent on inserting a lot of profanity and violent behavior in his narrative. But I persevered because I respect the opinion of the Goodreads friend who recommended it.
The book opens at 5:00 a.m. with Dr. Peter Brown watching a pigeon fight a rat in the snow when a mugger sticks a gun into the base of his skull. It’s cold, and it actually feels sort of good, in an acupressure kind of way. (I liked that line; will be sharing with my physiotherapist next week.) The mugger recognizes him as a doctor by his blue scrub pants, and must assume not only that the doc will do no harm, but that he must be carrying drugs and money. I barely have enough drugs and money to get me through the day. And the only oath I took, as I recall, was to first do no harm. I’m thinking we’re past that point…. I wrap his elbow and jerk upwards, causing ligaments to pop like champagne corks. Let’s take a moment to smell the rose known as the elbow. And during a medical explanation about the mechanics of what the protagonist just did, Josh Bazell takes the reader to his first footnote, and then ends the paragraph with: It’s a shame to tear these ligaments apart. But the good doctor isn’t exactly remorseful, and by the time the scene ends, we’ve read through a considerable dose of coarse language during the course of a vicious attack.
Turns out pill-popping Dr. Brown is the same person as Pietro "Bearclaw" Brnwa, ex-hit-man, whose story is told in third person past-tense. First-person narrator and present-day Peter is in a Witness Protection Program. When Peter returns to the hospital, he is recognized by a mobster who has cancer. It’s either his life or Peter’s; past and present meet up. The present-day lasts 8 hours, during which time Peter must Beat the Reaper. Flashbacks are used to show Pietro’s life with the grandparents who raised him, and to them being killed when Pietro is not quite fifteen years old. Pietro, now working for the Mafia, justifies killing: he is avenging the murder of his grandparents. As a doctor, Peter is supposedly atoning for his previous “life”, but as the opening scene shows us, he’s not totally over it.
Weaving back and forth in time, scene breaks show tiny graphics of the Reaper chasing him on foot. When he falls in love (“at-first-sight”) the graphics change to the Reaper on a tractor:
Plutarch says carrying new wives across thresholds is stupid because we don’t remember that it refers to the rape of the Sabine women – and that’s f-ing Plutarch, two thousand years ago. We still draw the Reaper with a scythe. We should draw him driving a John Deere for Archer Daniels Midland.
The book is littered with these little scene breaks as well as footnotes. Sometimes the footnotes are informative; sometimes the author is just checking to see that you’re awake, if you’re paying attention; or simply, *Like you care what this means. The narrative also continues to be riddled with profanity; brutal acts; scenes that are grisly enough to make one wince; and others that make it difficult to suspend belief. One sex scene was particularly improbable. One minute I’m rolling my eyes, and the next, actually laughing out loud.
It is action-packed, but I found the book easy to put down. Nor is it great literature. Here are a few of the more noteworthy lines:
- But the hounds don’t shun the fox for being mangy. The mob theory was all I had to go on, so I chased it.
- Ah, youth. It’s like heroin you’ve smoked instead of snorted. Gone so fast you can’t believe you still have to pay for it.
- It worried me. Skinflick was as immune to shame as anyone I knew, but even he had his limits. And the journey from shame to resentment is the shortest one there is.
Of course, Bazell is not pretending to offer good literature. Rather, what he gives the reader is a well-plotted story strewn throughout with bizarre ideas; that a one-legged girl might find a dance partner “down at the hop” is the kind of macabre humour we hear through Dr. Brown.
So, if you enjoy this sort of madcap action/thriller type of book, pick it up. As for me, I thought brain candy was something light and fluffy; cotton-candy for the mind. With Beat the Reaper I felt like I got black licorice.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 19, 2010
I just finished BEAT THE REAPER by Josh Bazell- simply put- it is one of the greatest comic crime thrillers I have ever read- I am talking the Immortal Elmore Leonard/Carl Hiaasen territory - Bazell wrote this- his first novel while completing his residency at a hospital (he is now a full doctor I believe) I am still shocked at how perfect this book was- it had everything- even hilarious footnotes(a la Terry Pratchett) and a main character who is so endearing and lifelike that you cant help but love him- even though he is in WITPROTECT Program and a former mob hitman- I have never read a book with more laugh-out loud lines-This book gets my very highest rating I can give
February 18, 2009
lately my book reviewing reminds me of that old snl skit where the guy reviews porn: 'interested, interested, really interested, then i lost all interest.'
i don't know if it's me or not.
this book started off with a bang. the tone of the narrator was a little obnoxious -- although isn't that a requirement for crime fiction? and why is that? it's' tired.
but that aside, the writer is entertaining and informative (truly some of the greatest hospital anecdotes i've ever read -- you almost wish he would write nonfiction) and funny and strange. i'm just not so sure he's nailed the narrative aspect, or the character development for that matter.
i got to where the novelty wore off and there wasn't much left to keep me going. again, it could be me. i'm in a weird place, reading-wise.
i don't know if it's me or not.
this book started off with a bang. the tone of the narrator was a little obnoxious -- although isn't that a requirement for crime fiction? and why is that? it's' tired.
but that aside, the writer is entertaining and informative (truly some of the greatest hospital anecdotes i've ever read -- you almost wish he would write nonfiction) and funny and strange. i'm just not so sure he's nailed the narrative aspect, or the character development for that matter.
i got to where the novelty wore off and there wasn't much left to keep me going. again, it could be me. i'm in a weird place, reading-wise.
December 19, 2024
That was a crazy ride … and I loved it.
Dr. Peter Brown (which is not his only name) became a killer for the mob after his grandparents who raised him were murdered and he got close to his friend’s family who was part of the mafia.
Bazell mixes his medical knowledge (he is an MD in real life) with his imagination to keep you going with the story and you’ll never know what’s going to happen next.
If you don’t like swearing or gorey descriptions mixed with gallows humor you might not enjoy this one. I loved it so I must be a little weird.
Also a good life lesson for you - don’t jump in a shark tank
Dr. Peter Brown (which is not his only name) became a killer for the mob after his grandparents who raised him were murdered and he got close to his friend’s family who was part of the mafia.
Bazell mixes his medical knowledge (he is an MD in real life) with his imagination to keep you going with the story and you’ll never know what’s going to happen next.
If you don’t like swearing or gorey descriptions mixed with gallows humor you might not enjoy this one. I loved it so I must be a little weird.
Also a good life lesson for you - don’t jump in a shark tank
April 27, 2012
Wow what a book. I only picked this one up for the Pulp Fiction book club and I never even looked at what it was about. Boy was I in for a surprise.
I started it tentatively as it kicks off with a doctor who seems rather handy in a fight and knows things a normal doctor wouldn't. From there it just ramps up and up and up. Part medical comedy, part gangster action this book floored me and I love every second of it. It feels like someone crossed Scrubs with The Sopranos. And it was smart. All the procedures and anecdotes are real. It's the first time in an action book I've had to stop and Google or Wikipedia things. It was great.
I can't wait to get the sequel and see where things go next. This was a really enjoyable, fast paced, intelligent action book and once you pick it up you won't put it down til you're finished.
One thing though. I'm not the most squeamish of people but there is a scene at the end of the book that really had me wincing. You've been warned.
I started it tentatively as it kicks off with a doctor who seems rather handy in a fight and knows things a normal doctor wouldn't. From there it just ramps up and up and up. Part medical comedy, part gangster action this book floored me and I love every second of it. It feels like someone crossed Scrubs with The Sopranos. And it was smart. All the procedures and anecdotes are real. It's the first time in an action book I've had to stop and Google or Wikipedia things. It was great.
I can't wait to get the sequel and see where things go next. This was a really enjoyable, fast paced, intelligent action book and once you pick it up you won't put it down til you're finished.
One thing though. I'm not the most squeamish of people but there is a scene at the end of the book that really had me wincing. You've been warned.
February 12, 2010
Well,the style of this book is to be edgey. I have no problem with that in general when it works for the story, but this was just angry to be angry. I didn't see the point. I hated every character in the book, the author didn't see any reason to make anyone of them likable. I couldn't take it anymore so I stopped it. uuhhggg.
June 23, 2018
I am now super knowledgeable about medicine, the mafia, the holocaust, and how to fight my way out of a bad situation using my own damn body parts. Thanks, Josh Bazell! Not sure I’ll sleep tonight.
November 24, 2008
Peter Brown is not your normal Manhattan ER doctor. When it comes to skeletons in the closest, he has tons. One of those skeletons he forced him to enter into the Witness Protection Program. Peter has been fighting with his demons for years. Peter was ready to start his day out like any other morning…with a walk in the park but there he gets mugged, than he receives an invite by a sexy pharmaceutical nurse for some TLC, and finally as if Peter’s day couldn’t get any worse, he new patient has tie ins with the Mob and is someone who happens to know who Peter Brown really is from his prior life.
Now Peter his to keep his new patient from dying or pay the consequences.
Josh Bazell is one of the freshest new authors I have read. Beat the Reaper starts off 2009 the right way. Peter Brown lays it all out. He holds back no punches and tells it like it is…no bullshit. This is why I like Peter. I do have to admit that at first when Peter would travel back in time to his prior life and than the present I did get a little lost but I blame this on the fact that I was so focused and into the book that the storyline ran all together for me. Once I figured out what was going on after the first time, I really got back into the story again. The footnotes that Mr. Bazell inserted throughout the book with his medical knowledge were very informative and helped add a little something extra to the book. I hope to see another book soon from Mr. Bazell.
Now Peter his to keep his new patient from dying or pay the consequences.
Josh Bazell is one of the freshest new authors I have read. Beat the Reaper starts off 2009 the right way. Peter Brown lays it all out. He holds back no punches and tells it like it is…no bullshit. This is why I like Peter. I do have to admit that at first when Peter would travel back in time to his prior life and than the present I did get a little lost but I blame this on the fact that I was so focused and into the book that the storyline ran all together for me. Once I figured out what was going on after the first time, I really got back into the story again. The footnotes that Mr. Bazell inserted throughout the book with his medical knowledge were very informative and helped add a little something extra to the book. I hope to see another book soon from Mr. Bazell.
March 1, 2020
Coming soon :-)
Quando Scrub incontra Pulp Fiction, succede che prima o poi ne faranno un film*: e che nessuno mi venga a dire che l'intento non era questo!
Bello l'inizio, un po' fiacca la parte centrale, inverosimile ma in crescendo il finale.
*mi tocca correggermi subito, ma a questo punto il mio ego gongola: a quanto pare l'hanno già fatto :-)
Quando Scrub incontra Pulp Fiction, succede che prima o poi ne faranno un film*: e che nessuno mi venga a dire che l'intento non era questo!
Bello l'inizio, un po' fiacca la parte centrale, inverosimile ma in crescendo il finale.
*mi tocca correggermi subito, ma a questo punto il mio ego gongola: a quanto pare l'hanno già fatto :-)
December 31, 2008
ok, here's the thing... at first i didn't think i was going to like this book that much. it seems a bit pretentious, especially the opening few paragraphs. its obvious they were meant to grab you and throw you into a world. and it works, only maybe you're not so sure its a world you care to explore. but here's the thing: i just kept reading and reading. it was engaging enough to keep me up all night just to see where things were going to go. its a bit like an episode of 'er' with flashbacks to 'the sopranos.' maybe i've done a poor job expressing myself. maybe this is a guilty pleasure book. but i did learn things about the human body from this book. its like getting educated while you're mindlessly entertained. since i gave it 4 stars -- mainly for entertainment value -- i obviously liked it. my best advice is to pick it up and get through the first chapter or 2. if it doesn't grab you by then, it won't.
January 15, 2010
I rarely if ever do this, but I'm doing it now. I loved this book. It is a great book. It is funny, savage, shocking, smart, and a great read. Go forth. Obtain it. Bathe in the madness. Giggle into your tea. Look with suspicion upon doctors. Gasp in horror.
Be Bazelled.
Be Bazelled.
August 19, 2023
কি পড়লাম! কেনো পড়লাম! টাকা দিয়ে কেনো কিনলাম! আর এই বই অনুবাদ ই বা কেনো হলো!
কিছুই বুঝলাম না।
কিছুই বুঝলাম না।
May 4, 2012
I was recommended this book last year, and while it looks interesting, I kept putting this book off. I’m not sure why I did, as this book was so much fun to read. Think mob book (in the style of Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels or Snatch) meets Scrubs but with a much darker sense of humour. Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell tells the story of Peter Brown, an intern for Manhattan’s worst hospital. Dr. Brown is in the Federal Witness Protection Program having previously been a mob hitman named Pietro Brwna. I know, the feds lacked imagination and yet the mob failed to find him until one of them ends up being a patient of Dr. Peter Brown.
Full reveiw can be found on my blog;
http://literary-exploration.com/2012/...
Full reveiw can be found on my blog;
http://literary-exploration.com/2012/...
May 3, 2020
Entertaining, Edgy and Quite Educational !
Extremely Vulgar & Explicitly Descriptive !
Outrageous and Over-The-Top !
Honestly, this tone was a bit much for me, yet impressive.
I bought this book at the Borders Bookstore Liquidation Sale in 2011, finally got around to reading Beat The Reaper in 2020 during the world-wide pandemic of COVID-19.
Favorite Passages:
WARNING
All parts of this book except this paragraph, the acknowledgements, and the dedication are fiction. Even the epigraph is fiction. Believing otherwise, particularly regarding medical information, would be a very bad idea.
_______
"Do you need anything else?"
"No." She pauses. "Not unless you want to give me a foot massage."
"I can give you a foot massage."
She blushes like a police siren, but keeps her eyes on mine.
"Really?"
"Why not?" I sit down on the edge of the bed and take her foot. Start pushing the ligament of her arch around with the edge of my thumb.
"Oh, fuck," she says. She closes her eyes, and tears come out of them.
"Sorry," I say.
"Don't stop."
I keep going. After a while she says, barely loud enough to here, "Will you lick it?"
I look up at her. "Lick what?"
"My foot, you pervert," she says, still not opening her eyes.
So I lift her foot to my mouth and lick along the arch.
"And my leg," she says.
I sigh. I lick up the inside of her leg, almost to her crotch.
Then I stand up. Wondering, briefly, what my life as as doctor might look like if I ever behaved like a professional.
_______
It took so much attention just to pick my way forward that I didn't notice the ravens until one dropped to a branch above and in front of me. Another two stayed higher up and watched me. I lay back against the snow and stared at them. They were the largest wild birds I'd ever seen. After a while they started cleaning themselves like cats.
I breathed the clean sharp air and wondered whether ravens could live as long as parrots, and if so whether these ones had been here during World War II. Or World War I, for that matter. I wondered in my grandparents had ever tried to eat them.
If they hadn't tried to eat them, what had they tried to eat? How did you even get around in a place like this? How did you do laundry, let alone fight off Nazis? The place was like some kind of afterlife.
Eventually one of the ravens screamed, and all three flew away.
_______
Bialowieza is the last remains of a forest that once covered eighty percent of Europe. Seeing another chunk of it mowed down was like watching the navel of the world sanded off. It left one less point of entrance to the past - my grandparents' or anyone else's. One less sign that we'd been human to begin with.
And one more piece of history as vapor, in which you could see anything you wanted, or nothing at all.
_______
In my upper bunk I ditched the blanket, which appeared to have an inordinate amount of pubic hair woven into it, and lay on the sheets in my overcoat, reading by the bare bulb near my head.
_______
Holy shit! The Smurfs built a medieval village on a hill! And it still looks great, as finely detailed as a clock, because the Nazi governor of Poland lived in the castle and protected the buildings!
_______
Calling a tongue piercing "cosmetic" is a bit of a stretch, since you don't get one because if makes you look better. You get one because you're so desperate for affection that you're willing to gruesomely harm yourself to advertise how well you suck dick.
_______
A woman who mates with her first cousin adds about 2 percent to her chance of having a kid with a birth defect. (For comparison, a woman who conceives at age forty has a 10 percent chance that the fetus will have Down's Syndrome.) On the other hand, offspring of cousins may benefit from an increased chance of family stability. Either way, the human genome is already far more "conserved," i.e., inbred, than that of any other known mammal, so we've already done a lot more cousin-jumping than, say, the rat.
_______
"He's a patient at the hospital, and he escaped."
"Mental patient?"
"No. He's got gangrene in his feet. Though he is demented."
_______
"I was busy. I was fucking his aunt in one of the Port-a-Potties."
"Shirl?" I said.
He looked uncomfortable. "Yeah."
"Yuck for her," I said. "I hope she was drunk."
But I didn't really care.
Love was in the air.
_______
. . . she gave off a feeling of ancientness like you'd imagine from a vampire, or an angel.
_______
. . . if you're going to be soulless, you should at least consider outsourcing your conscience to someone else.
_______
When I recall that time now, it seems like my mind was fogged. Though maybe it's my memory that's off.
_______
"I AM GONNA KILL YOU SLOW, THEN FEED YOU TO YOURSELF"
Deliverance is The Godfather for crackers.
________
"Are you married?" I say.
"No. I wear this ring to keep supermodels from rubbing up against me in the subway."
________
"Where'd you get a mouth like that?" I ask her.
"I'm sorry," she says, sarcastically. "None of the boys are gonna want to take me dancing."
"Sure they will," I say. "Down at the hop."
"You fucker!" she says.
I wipe the tears off her cheeks. "I have to go."
"Kiss me, you asshole," she says. I do.
I'm still doing it when there's a throat clearing noise behind me. It's two surgery techs come to wheel her away so she can get her leg cut off.
"Oh shit I'm scared," she says when they lift her to the stretcher bed. She's holding my hand, which is sweating.
"You'll be okay," I say.
"They'll probably cut off the wrong leg."
"That's true. But the second time they operate it'll be harder to fuck up."
"Fuck you."
They wheel her away.
_______
I wake up. It's difficult. It takes a couple of tries. I'm so incredibly cold that staying asleep seems preferable to finding out why.
Eventually, though, I try to turn over, and the the fact that my dick is stuck to the floor wakes me all the way up immediately. At first I think my dick has been nailed there, since it's so numb it feels like a piece of leather that's tethering me in place. Then I touch it and decide it's been glued there. Then I realize it's frozen to the steel floor.
I spit into my left hand - I'm rolled over on my right arm, and I don't want to lie on my stomach again, even for a moment, to free it - and use the spit to de-ice my dick. It takes a couple of applications.
Extremely Vulgar & Explicitly Descriptive !
Outrageous and Over-The-Top !
Honestly, this tone was a bit much for me, yet impressive.
I bought this book at the Borders Bookstore Liquidation Sale in 2011, finally got around to reading Beat The Reaper in 2020 during the world-wide pandemic of COVID-19.
Favorite Passages:
WARNING
All parts of this book except this paragraph, the acknowledgements, and the dedication are fiction. Even the epigraph is fiction. Believing otherwise, particularly regarding medical information, would be a very bad idea.
_______
"Do you need anything else?"
"No." She pauses. "Not unless you want to give me a foot massage."
"I can give you a foot massage."
She blushes like a police siren, but keeps her eyes on mine.
"Really?"
"Why not?" I sit down on the edge of the bed and take her foot. Start pushing the ligament of her arch around with the edge of my thumb.
"Oh, fuck," she says. She closes her eyes, and tears come out of them.
"Sorry," I say.
"Don't stop."
I keep going. After a while she says, barely loud enough to here, "Will you lick it?"
I look up at her. "Lick what?"
"My foot, you pervert," she says, still not opening her eyes.
So I lift her foot to my mouth and lick along the arch.
"And my leg," she says.
I sigh. I lick up the inside of her leg, almost to her crotch.
Then I stand up. Wondering, briefly, what my life as as doctor might look like if I ever behaved like a professional.
_______
It took so much attention just to pick my way forward that I didn't notice the ravens until one dropped to a branch above and in front of me. Another two stayed higher up and watched me. I lay back against the snow and stared at them. They were the largest wild birds I'd ever seen. After a while they started cleaning themselves like cats.
I breathed the clean sharp air and wondered whether ravens could live as long as parrots, and if so whether these ones had been here during World War II. Or World War I, for that matter. I wondered in my grandparents had ever tried to eat them.
If they hadn't tried to eat them, what had they tried to eat? How did you even get around in a place like this? How did you do laundry, let alone fight off Nazis? The place was like some kind of afterlife.
Eventually one of the ravens screamed, and all three flew away.
_______
Bialowieza is the last remains of a forest that once covered eighty percent of Europe. Seeing another chunk of it mowed down was like watching the navel of the world sanded off. It left one less point of entrance to the past - my grandparents' or anyone else's. One less sign that we'd been human to begin with.
And one more piece of history as vapor, in which you could see anything you wanted, or nothing at all.
_______
In my upper bunk I ditched the blanket, which appeared to have an inordinate amount of pubic hair woven into it, and lay on the sheets in my overcoat, reading by the bare bulb near my head.
_______
Holy shit! The Smurfs built a medieval village on a hill! And it still looks great, as finely detailed as a clock, because the Nazi governor of Poland lived in the castle and protected the buildings!
_______
Calling a tongue piercing "cosmetic" is a bit of a stretch, since you don't get one because if makes you look better. You get one because you're so desperate for affection that you're willing to gruesomely harm yourself to advertise how well you suck dick.
_______
A woman who mates with her first cousin adds about 2 percent to her chance of having a kid with a birth defect. (For comparison, a woman who conceives at age forty has a 10 percent chance that the fetus will have Down's Syndrome.) On the other hand, offspring of cousins may benefit from an increased chance of family stability. Either way, the human genome is already far more "conserved," i.e., inbred, than that of any other known mammal, so we've already done a lot more cousin-jumping than, say, the rat.
_______
"He's a patient at the hospital, and he escaped."
"Mental patient?"
"No. He's got gangrene in his feet. Though he is demented."
_______
"I was busy. I was fucking his aunt in one of the Port-a-Potties."
"Shirl?" I said.
He looked uncomfortable. "Yeah."
"Yuck for her," I said. "I hope she was drunk."
But I didn't really care.
Love was in the air.
_______
. . . she gave off a feeling of ancientness like you'd imagine from a vampire, or an angel.
_______
. . . if you're going to be soulless, you should at least consider outsourcing your conscience to someone else.
_______
When I recall that time now, it seems like my mind was fogged. Though maybe it's my memory that's off.
_______
"I AM GONNA KILL YOU SLOW, THEN FEED YOU TO YOURSELF"
Deliverance is The Godfather for crackers.
________
"Are you married?" I say.
"No. I wear this ring to keep supermodels from rubbing up against me in the subway."
________
"Where'd you get a mouth like that?" I ask her.
"I'm sorry," she says, sarcastically. "None of the boys are gonna want to take me dancing."
"Sure they will," I say. "Down at the hop."
"You fucker!" she says.
I wipe the tears off her cheeks. "I have to go."
"Kiss me, you asshole," she says. I do.
I'm still doing it when there's a throat clearing noise behind me. It's two surgery techs come to wheel her away so she can get her leg cut off.
"Oh shit I'm scared," she says when they lift her to the stretcher bed. She's holding my hand, which is sweating.
"You'll be okay," I say.
"They'll probably cut off the wrong leg."
"That's true. But the second time they operate it'll be harder to fuck up."
"Fuck you."
They wheel her away.
_______
I wake up. It's difficult. It takes a couple of tries. I'm so incredibly cold that staying asleep seems preferable to finding out why.
Eventually, though, I try to turn over, and the the fact that my dick is stuck to the floor wakes me all the way up immediately. At first I think my dick has been nailed there, since it's so numb it feels like a piece of leather that's tethering me in place. Then I touch it and decide it's been glued there. Then I realize it's frozen to the steel floor.
I spit into my left hand - I'm rolled over on my right arm, and I don't want to lie on my stomach again, even for a moment, to free it - and use the spit to de-ice my dick. It takes a couple of applications.
January 27, 2009
Great mix of medical thriller and mob revenge tale. Main character is a foul-mouthed and very funny former hit man who's hiding out as a doctor in a run-down hospital. If his former boss/mentor finds him, it means he's probably dead. I was hooked immediately and especially liked his hilarious and ironic footnotes.
September 3, 2011
Josh Bazell is a rare writer in a way that he graduated with a B.A. in English Literature yet gave up its PhD program to earn Doctor of Medicine. He is now a medical resident in San Francisco, probably spending his time doing remedial procedures doctors do with a nice story to boot. It was a huge surprise for me then to find a first-print copy of his debut novel Beat the Ripper stuffed casually inside the bargain bin for all to see. Set in a ramshackle New York hospital, it tells the story of Peter Brown, who after spending his childhood as a Mafia thug becomes a doctor while under witness protection program, and this wouldn’t be an exciting read, of course, if former enemies wouldn’t sprout like ghosts of Christmas past and resuscitate his bygone killer instincts.
Though the set-up resonates with the usual tales of retired killers being haunted by their histories, a refreshingly original aspect comes in the form of Bazell’s protagonist. Lethal as he is presented to be, Peter Brown is still a lovable character, one who sure knows his way around words, twisting metaphors the way he does to ligaments of his foes, providing a fast and surprisingly stress-free read. Of course, stress-free does not describe what Brown has to narrate. The novel jumps from the doctor’s past, his action-packed life as an errand boy for the Mafia, to his supposedly dreary role as a medical man, running from room to room, checking buttocks, chasing after senile escapees and, in one random portion, even going as far as licking the foot of a female patient. Frankly, through writing that defies all rules of grammar (hell, it even has footnotes, the majority of them outrageously useless) in exchange for the development of a character, Bazell has created a killer-turned-doctor readers will love, and Peter Brown definitely is as endearing as Aravind Adiga’s White Tiger protagonist-slash-murderer.
Alas, after pages of Brown exposing the cavities of the American healthcare system, avenging the death of his grandparents, slaying a family of human traffickers, and swimming in a shark tank to rescue his girlfriend, all Bazell has to provide us in the end is a conclusion that seems so random I felt unsure if my own copy is legit; then I found out that a sequel is in the works, which is a shame, considering how he could have written an ending that allows the book to have a stand-alone feel, and since this would get a film adaptation with Leonardo DiCaprio as the doctor himself, I am quite worried how the director is going to handle it. Still, Beat the Reaper is a suspenseful and frequently funny read. Lackluster ending aside, reading this has more worth than being a medical intern under Dr. Brown.
Though the set-up resonates with the usual tales of retired killers being haunted by their histories, a refreshingly original aspect comes in the form of Bazell’s protagonist. Lethal as he is presented to be, Peter Brown is still a lovable character, one who sure knows his way around words, twisting metaphors the way he does to ligaments of his foes, providing a fast and surprisingly stress-free read. Of course, stress-free does not describe what Brown has to narrate. The novel jumps from the doctor’s past, his action-packed life as an errand boy for the Mafia, to his supposedly dreary role as a medical man, running from room to room, checking buttocks, chasing after senile escapees and, in one random portion, even going as far as licking the foot of a female patient. Frankly, through writing that defies all rules of grammar (hell, it even has footnotes, the majority of them outrageously useless) in exchange for the development of a character, Bazell has created a killer-turned-doctor readers will love, and Peter Brown definitely is as endearing as Aravind Adiga’s White Tiger protagonist-slash-murderer.
Alas, after pages of Brown exposing the cavities of the American healthcare system, avenging the death of his grandparents, slaying a family of human traffickers, and swimming in a shark tank to rescue his girlfriend, all Bazell has to provide us in the end is a conclusion that seems so random I felt unsure if my own copy is legit; then I found out that a sequel is in the works, which is a shame, considering how he could have written an ending that allows the book to have a stand-alone feel, and since this would get a film adaptation with Leonardo DiCaprio as the doctor himself, I am quite worried how the director is going to handle it. Still, Beat the Reaper is a suspenseful and frequently funny read. Lackluster ending aside, reading this has more worth than being a medical intern under Dr. Brown.
March 16, 2018
An absolutely outrageous story jam-packed with extremely dark and, it has to be said, some very sick humour. Peter Brown is an intern at a Manhattan hospital. He's also a former hitman for the Mafia and currently in the Witness Protection programme.
The action switches between Peter's work at the hospital and his earlier life, beginning when he was raised by his Jewish grandparents who were murdered in their home and their bodies discovered by Pete who was set on his path to becoming a professional killer - but only of people who were really, really bad and deserved to die.
From the opening pages, when Pete beats up a mugger who tried to rob him at gunpoint on his way to work, then has sex in a hospital elevator with a young female drugs rep, the action is relentless.
But worse is to follow. On his rounds, Pete is recognised by Nicholas LoBrutto, a patient who knows he is on a Mafia hit list. The author was himself a medical resident at the University of California, San Francisco, so he knows what he's writing about and he clearly isn't a publicist for America's health care system - not even close. His sideswipes at the latter are hilarious and he even manages to raise smiles about incidents from his earlier life, including a trip to Auschwitz which is a savage indictment of Poland's current attitude to the Holocaust.
Bazell litters the pages of his book with brilliant footnotes on all manner of subjects, but mostly on medical procedures which will have you thinking long and hard about EVER going into hospital.
If you want someone else's opinion on how good this book is, it comes highly recommended by - among others - Harlan Coben, Don Winslow and Michael Connelly (and if you don't know who they are, you shouldn't be allowed to read books!)
If you're easily offended, do not read this book. Hell, even if it takes a lot to get offended, you'll find yourself wincing at some points during the story. But if you want a slice of real life in the raw, then you'll love this fast, furious and outrageously funny tale. A book that I will keep and read again - especially those wonderfully informative and occasionally downright scary footnotes!
The action switches between Peter's work at the hospital and his earlier life, beginning when he was raised by his Jewish grandparents who were murdered in their home and their bodies discovered by Pete who was set on his path to becoming a professional killer - but only of people who were really, really bad and deserved to die.
From the opening pages, when Pete beats up a mugger who tried to rob him at gunpoint on his way to work, then has sex in a hospital elevator with a young female drugs rep, the action is relentless.
But worse is to follow. On his rounds, Pete is recognised by Nicholas LoBrutto, a patient who knows he is on a Mafia hit list. The author was himself a medical resident at the University of California, San Francisco, so he knows what he's writing about and he clearly isn't a publicist for America's health care system - not even close. His sideswipes at the latter are hilarious and he even manages to raise smiles about incidents from his earlier life, including a trip to Auschwitz which is a savage indictment of Poland's current attitude to the Holocaust.
Bazell litters the pages of his book with brilliant footnotes on all manner of subjects, but mostly on medical procedures which will have you thinking long and hard about EVER going into hospital.
If you want someone else's opinion on how good this book is, it comes highly recommended by - among others - Harlan Coben, Don Winslow and Michael Connelly (and if you don't know who they are, you shouldn't be allowed to read books!)
If you're easily offended, do not read this book. Hell, even if it takes a lot to get offended, you'll find yourself wincing at some points during the story. But if you want a slice of real life in the raw, then you'll love this fast, furious and outrageously funny tale. A book that I will keep and read again - especially those wonderfully informative and occasionally downright scary footnotes!
January 26, 2012
I like that this is tagged "Adult" over there in the genres list. That is accurate! All of the athletic oral sex and hospital patient genitalia descriptions started to feel a little out of place after a while, since this book has plenty of other things going on (although one of those patient's genitalia actually solves a medical mystery, so I supposed that's justified.) Regardless, Dr! Josh Bazell's hospital- book-meets-Goodfellas gives a swift temple punch to all those generic medical thrillers you see in supermarkets. There's a shark tank in this book that had me appropriately about to pee my pants with dread. What's a good tongue-in-cheek* mafia thriller without a shark tank?
* = I am fighting my instinct to make a joke about tongues in things in reference to this book.
I wish I had read this when I was working at the bookstore, because it is the perfect book to recommend to someone looking for a fast read. Readers looking for exciting, action-packed, beach book sorts of recommendations were always the toughest customers for me to wait on. Because my idea of a good book is the opposite of one that reads fast and has little characterization -- I'm not being a snob, that's just the way I read -- and the odds of a customer with standards questioning their trust in my expertise when I throw a James Patterson book at them and say, "He's popular!" are very high. If you are at all passionate about encouraging people to read more, the last thing you want someone to do is doubt your ability to lead them to a good book.
But I read the majority of this one yesterday and today while laid up at home with a migraine and a low-grade fever, slipping in and out (ha ha) of sleep, and had no problems understanding it, remembering where I was, or enjoying it. It's funny. It's smart. Its plot is suspenseful. Thriller readers, this is the first qualified advice I can give to you: this book is recommended.
* = I am fighting my instinct to make a joke about tongues in things in reference to this book.
I wish I had read this when I was working at the bookstore, because it is the perfect book to recommend to someone looking for a fast read. Readers looking for exciting, action-packed, beach book sorts of recommendations were always the toughest customers for me to wait on. Because my idea of a good book is the opposite of one that reads fast and has little characterization -- I'm not being a snob, that's just the way I read -- and the odds of a customer with standards questioning their trust in my expertise when I throw a James Patterson book at them and say, "He's popular!" are very high. If you are at all passionate about encouraging people to read more, the last thing you want someone to do is doubt your ability to lead them to a good book.
But I read the majority of this one yesterday and today while laid up at home with a migraine and a low-grade fever, slipping in and out (ha ha) of sleep, and had no problems understanding it, remembering where I was, or enjoying it. It's funny. It's smart. Its plot is suspenseful. Thriller readers, this is the first qualified advice I can give to you: this book is recommended.
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