Customer Reviews

The Bullet's Yaw: Reflections on violence, healing and an unforgettable stranger

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Dr. Ballard is a burgeoning Ernest Hemingway trapped inside the body of an ER doctor. Among other things, Ballard takes the reader inside the ER room with a short, captivating account of a victim of gun violence and his slow, emotional recovery. Many of the other reviews here appropriately note Dr. Ballard's fascinating account of the development of emergency medicine protocols, his skill in describing the victim's anguishing return to normalcy, as well the his scientific account of the disturbing preponderance of gun violence in America. I second those glowing reviews and would simply add that for me the most compelling aspect of the book was the opportunity to walk in the shoes of an ER doctor for a few, brief moments. Entry into the ER as either a victim, or the loved one of a victim, is the ultimate leap of faith and journey into complete helplessness. We have no choice but to entrust our lives or those of our loved ones to the whims of this opaque institutions - the ER. Dr. Ballard demystifies the process by putting the reader on the other side of this exchange. The reader learns that while a trip to the ER is first and foremost the ultimate role of the dice, thanks to the trailblazing efforts of Dr. Blaisdell and others there is a tested process in place to reduce the element of chance. Even more reassuring, the reader learns that while the ER may have institutional safeguards in place that sometimes give it the antiseptic feel of a factory, with doctors like Ballard on duty, the victim is ultimately in very good hands.

The Bullet's Yawn?
Not.
That being so succinctly said, I'm not going to presume here to write a review of "The Bullet's Yaw" with the sparkling wit or erudite charm of some of the other reviews I've read because I'm not a writer. But I am a reader. I read a lot. I enjoy reading. And, based solely on these qualifications, I found The Bullet's Yaw to be as readable and well written as most of the literature I've consumed over the years.
As I was into my enjoyment of this very manageable book, I was reminded of a style of writing that I deeply admire; that of "science writers" - authors who take that potentially dry-as-toast subject matter that Discover or Scientific American feature and turn it into something not only digestible, but very tasty. And that's what Dr. Ballard has successfully done with "The Bullet's Yaw". As with good photography, he's taken a shot of a scene that we normally may not have given a second glance and done so with the artistic sensibility to fascinate us with it. It's good news to hear that the author is contemplating the expansion of the book into a longer-length version.
Another reviewer mentioned that they weren't sure whose story was being told here and I'm not seeing that as a weakness of the story telling, but rather another layer of good story-telling technique. I started "The Bullet's Yaw" thinking that I was going to be reading the story of Jeffrey Mains, but was pleasantly treated to a layer cake of subjects. (I told you I wasn't a writer; I'm stuck in food-analogy land.) It was even a nice surprise to have the subjects of gun violence and traumatic-injury-as-disease handled so deftly and unapologetically. Rather than being a distraction from the story of Jeffrey Mains, they were the logical extension of that story.
My nagging complaint with 80% of novels that I read is with their timing - in particular that their endings are too rushed or condensed. I'm going to continue that nag with Dr. Ballard and ask him to not pick up speed as he reaches the finish line. I've been right there with you up to that point, I'm not going to jump ship at the end because it's "taking too long". This coming from someone with the attention span of a fly.
Thanks for the means to spend a pleasant afternoon and exercise my brain at the same time. I'm looking forward to The Bullet's Yaw's next incarnation.

Many of us are drawn to the time tested TV medical drama formula used by the likes of ER or Grey's Anatomy. A victim is rushed to the hospital after some heinous crime or outrageous mishap. Doctors speak in declarative, jargon filled sentences in their urgent attempts to save John or Jane Doe. Family members and friends trickle into the hospital to color in the life that the victim was leading before landing in the emergency room. We are shocked by the nature of the injury, fascinated by the medical procedure, and begin to feel emotionally invested in the victim. But there is a problem with this formula: is often over-scripted, sensationalized, and/or fake. Dr. Ballard's autobiographical account of his dealings with one of his most memorable patients, on the other hand, is painfully real.

In this short, very readable book, Ballard brings the emergency department to life. We learn the real reason why Doe is such a common surname on hospital charts, we effortlessly begin to attach meaning to medical terms, and we develop an appreciation for how the doctor's mind works in making diagnoses under severe time pressure to the robotic two-minute drill of their daily rounds. Yet in telling the story of Jeffrey Mains, an innocent victim to a shooting rampage, Ballard's compelling narrative follows his patient outside of the hospital to show how difficult it can be to regain some sense of normalcy after such trauma. He deftly uses Jeffrey's experience to underscore broader societal problems including gun control and the failure to exchange psychiatric information across state borders that indirectly abet senseless violence such as the recent killings at the Northern Illinois University.

If there is a weak point to this book, however, some readers might find it difficult to invest emotionally in Jeffrey, in part because the author at times seemed to have trouble establishing a connection himself. Ironically, the perpetrator of the attack, Joseph Ferguson (and the shocking, though briefly described personal circumstances that led to his terrible crime), represented perhaps the book's most unforgettable stranger. Should Ballard ever choose to revise or expand this book, it might be worthwhile not only to generate more reader sympathy for the challenges of the healing process (perhaps by taking additional steps to humanize Mains or introducing other patients facing similar challenges), but also to delve more deeply into Ferguson's story, which provides the launching point for much of the author's social commentary on violence. Overall though, The Bullet's Yaw is an important, authoritative, and thoughtful work that is engaging enough to captivate the Grey's Anatomy audience and substantive enough to resonate with health care and policy practitioners.

Dr. Ballard's compact and engaging narrative comes through as a highly thought-provoking conversation with a brilliant dinner guest. This book's purpose and argument concerns violence and its prevention, and specifically firearms violence, which he correctly notes is an extremely toxic debate in the United States. Ballard's book earns the right to discuss it by laying a very human presentation of the challenging and harrowing details faced by an urban hospital trauma unit, details most Americans know nothing of and may never encounter even once. Ballard then trains his lens specifically on Jeffrey Mains, a badly wounded victim of a psychotic's gun rampage. Mains' cruel and unnecessary injuries and the physical and emotional challenge of his recovery are delivered first as a medical procedural, and later fleshed out in personal terms. But after laying both foundations, then Ballard states his conscience: That firearms violence is, like deaths from automobile accidents in the 1960s, "a neglected disease" in that both, in their era, pose seemingly intractable problems to trauma response physicians nationwide. In the 1960s, a combination of accident prevention and trauma medicine innovation -- both of which Ballard reports completely and cogently, with a personal association with the principals involved -- combined to reduce traffic fatalities by two thirds. Today, such a meaningful public health approach to gun violence is long overdue. Ballard, whose opinion is both personal and relevant, proposes a reasonable plan of accident prevention, as applied to firearms purchasing and ownership. One senses that it is offered in hopes that the blind risks we seem to accept today will become shockingly clear, and seem as primitive and unacceptable as the dangerous conditions a motorist faced 40 years ago.

As a fan of Dr. Ballard's previous book, I was not surprised to find this slim case study stuffed with his characteristic wit, curiosity and knack for explaining complex material (mostly medical in this case) in fluid, fast-moving prose. It seems to me that this book has all the raw materials to make an excellent medical case study. However, I suggest that before completing and expanding this book, Dr. Ballard ought to resolve this fundamental question. Whose story is this, his or Jeffrey Mains'? Certainly, it is possible to write a compelling story about a how dramatic event may have profound repercussions for two people. Indeed, Dr. Ballard's own previous book (co- written by his wife), is a fine example of such a story. However, in that case, the dual narration worked because the reader saw the same story (a relationship tested by the rigors of a 2,000 mile hike)from two sides, each with an equal stake in the outcome. Anne Fadiman, in her classic medical-case study book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, managed the trick of dual points of view by profiling both, on the one hand, the patient and her family, and, on the other hand, the entire medical community which treated her. Here, the emotional investment in the story is lopsided, with Jeffrey Mains having, obviously, a more urgent claim to the story. To balance this, I would suggest that the author either profile Jeffrey Mains in more depth,and drop himself from the story entirely. Or, as Fadiman did, Dr. Ballard could alternate the story from Mains' point of view and from that of the entire medical community, including of course Dr. Ballard, but also including the nurses, paramedics, surgeons, psychiatrists and physical therapists that have helped him heal.
Good luck!
This seems very promising

Bought this book after stumbling across Dr. Ballard's blog. It's a short one, but it has the advantage of being told by someone who has a "you won't believe what I do for a living" type of job. For voyeurism alone, it's a worthy read. Lots of humor. Lots of crass social commentary (which I dig). It also brims with far more humanity than I expected. Dr. Ballard comes off as a quirky guy who day-in and day-out bears witness to the best and worst of human nature ... without losing appreciation for the privilege of this role. At the risk of sounding like a movie trailer voice-over, I was left wanting more. And one senses that there's a fair bit still lurking beneath the surface here. More oh-my-god moments that stretch the bounds of belief -- so funny if not true. More life lessons set in the extreme. More healthy reconciliation with faces from the past. "Bullet" whets the appetite. Can't wait for the next 300 pages.

A quick and powerful read full of thought-provoking, intriguing and galvanizing facts, reflections, and anecdotes. Anyone who is concerned about the state of health care today and increasing gun violence in our schools and communities (who isn't?) should read this book and pass it on to others. This book is quite different from Dustin (Duffy) Ballard's original, award-winning entry into publishing (A Blistered Kind of Love, The Mountaineers Books) but the reader can see how he's both progressed as a writer and also retained his entertaining and original voice.