3 out of 4 stars
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When I first saw the title of Days of the Giants by RJ Petrella, I immediately thought it had something to do with baseball. I’m not sure why because as an Australian, baseball is not one of our popular sports. I was relieved to find that the book has nothing to do with sport, but is a story about a conflict over the proposed amalgamation of two large teaching hospitals in Boston. The ‘Giants’ it refers to are the great men and women who established the public health system in America and kept it running against the odds. The tale is loosely based on historical facts and persons who served the Boston City Hospital (BCH) prior to the 1970’s, although the merger was never mooted in truth.
The characters are an assortment of administrators, doctors, nurses, patients, and politicians, with the main man being a medical resident named Slater Barnes. Slater had thought he wanted to be a doctor for most of his young life, but when the time came to leave medical school and begin his ‘real’ training at BCH, he is assailed by self-doubt and trepidation. He has a lovely girlfriend named Sofia, and although they are very close and loving, Slater never feels able to share his feelings with her verbally. This ultimately meant that they chose to work in different hospitals in different states and the relationship waned.
The book begins with a prologue describing the brutal murder of a resident doctor late one night. The identity of the unfortunate victim is not revealed until much later in the book, and this sparks a little frisson of suspense. The first three or four chapters set the scene for the story by explaining the prevailing political climate in Boston, Slater’s family history and circumstances, and overall they provide the groundwork required by the reader to understand the nitty-gritty of the plot. Without a lot of personal engagement with the characters, I found the first part of the book to be a little dry and confusing.
This confusion was not aided by the fact that the entire book is written as a chatty narrative, with a style very like you would use in conversation with a good friend at the pub – but from two different narrators, Slater and his deceased father. Although they each had a distinct ‘speaking’ manner, it took me a good while to figure out who narrated each chapter as they sometimes both covered the same event from a different angle. I found the over-familiarity somewhat annoying after a while, though by the end of the book I can see the author’s skill in using this technique to give the plot more depth.
As time goes on, Slater finds that he does really enjoy his residency, though the stress and sleep-deprivation he endures leads him to a dangerous alcohol dependency and a serious health condition of his own. The story continues to weave around the politics and ambitions of the many individuals whose lives depend on the BCH, and the conspiracy surrounding the proposed merger between BCH and Academy Hospital becomes more apparent. Without giving too much away, there are a couple of unexpected twists and surprises in store before the author gathers the threads of the story together to a satisfying conclusion.
The editing was remarkably good, with no punctuation or grammar errors noticed, apart from the colloquial sentence structure the narrators used to make their points. This being like a dialogue, I believe these inconsistencies are a deliberate action on the author’s part to make the characters believable and unique. Having some medical background myself, I feel the jargon and the medical details used are relatively authentic to the period in which the book is set.
I give Days of the Giants 3 out of 4 stars. I would have awarded 3.5 stars if it was possible, deducting a half-star only because the chatty style of the narration annoyed me somewhat. This book should appeal to those who enjoy a complex medical drama, or those who are interested in stories of political machinations behind the scenes. There are no graphic scenes of violence and minimal bad language. I wouldn’t say this is a ‘Giant’ of a story, but the plot is well-planned and well-executed, and although it is a little slow in places it is an enjoyable read.
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Days of the Giants
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