Shock [Hardcover]

Robin Cook (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2001

Technology and greed converge in this spine-tingling novel of medicine run amok by the bestselling master of medical suspense.

Deborah Cochrane and Joanna Meissner, graduate science students and close friends, spot a campus newspaper ad that promises to solve their financial problems: an exclusive, highly profitable fertility clinic on Boston's North Shore is looking for egg donors. Deborah and Joanna figure they can do a good deed-help infertile couples-and earn money. Although rumors of a fellow student donor's unexplained disappearance surface, the duo is not deterred.

The procedures seem to go smoothly. Deborah is particularly intrigued by the technology involved and by Dr. Spencer Windgate, the charismatic fertility expert responsible for the clinic's success. But second thoughts and curiosity prompt the two women to find out more about the fate of their donated eggs. Stymied by the clinic's veil of secrecy, Deborah and Joanna obtain employment there to continue their probe. Working under aliases, they soon discover the horrifying aims of Dr. Windgate's research, immediately putting their lives-and their sanity-irrevocably at risk.

Posited on up-to-the-minute science, Shock finds Robin Cook at the uncertain crossroads of medical technology and ethics.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Robin Cook, master of bestselling medical thrillers, answers the "What's the worst thing that could happen?" question in this plot-twisting novel in which villains with no sense of ethics or social responsibility get their greedy hands on the newest cloning technology. It starts when a couple of Harvard graduate students answer the Wingate Clinic's ad for egg donors. The women figure on financing a year in Venice and the down payment on a Boston condo with the extraordinary sum they're promised. But a year later, the heroines feel the emotional need to seek out the children they've made possible for infertile couples. So they disguise themselves and seek jobs at the clinic in order to access the identifying information. The clinic, as it turns out, has plenty of secrets to protect, so it's hard to believe that a pair of computer neophytes could bypass its security. But they do, and the author is an adept enough writer to finesse this detail.

As in past books, Cook is much better at the technical details of medical research than he is at characterization, but he definitely knows how to plot a thriller. This one keeps you turning the pages until the final denouement, though the last chapter ends abruptly, leaving the reader to wonder whether he ran out of steam or is just setting up a sequel in which he'll recycle the villains in a new scheme with a new pair of victims. --Jane Adams

From Publishers Weekly

The medical thriller has come a long way since Cook and Michael Crichton invented it: recent practitioners like Tess Gerritson have polished it into a powerful dramatic and social engine. Alas, Cook appears to have gotten off at the wrong station or missed the train entirely, judging by his latest effort, a crudely conceived, ineptly written and most damning of all totally unexciting story ripped from old headlines. Things have been going to hell at the Wingate Fertility Clinic, housed in a rambling Victorian mansion near Boston, ever since the gifted Dr. Spencer Wingate decided to take some time off to write a novel and chase women. Not only was he unsuccessful at both activities, but the nasty little replacement he left in charge has been doing some weird stuff including paying young Harvard women $45,000 for their eggs and driving down the profits. Spencer returns at the same time as two of these women, Deborah Cochrane and Joanna Meissner, who have been spending their payment on Boston real estate and a year in Venice. Judging by the burly security guards on hand who conveniently dispose of a donor who dies on the operating table (and her friend, too) in the first chapter, Deborah and Joanna aren't about to be greeted with open arms. They manage to join the clinic staff under assumed names, hoping to find out what became of the eggs they contributed. Add a farm straight from The Island of Dr. Moreau, where the Wingate staff experiment on animals when they're not busy applying unethical electric shock treatments to human zygotes, and the result is a medical and literary mess with no redeeming features. Advertising on the Today show and CNN; author tour.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Putnam Adult; 1ST edition (January 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0399146008
• ISBN-13: 978-0399146008
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 1.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (165 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #736,283 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Doctor and author Robin Cook is widely credited with introducing the word 'medical' to the thriller genre, and over twenty years after the publication of his breakthrough novel, Coma, he continues to dominate the category he created. Cook has successfully combined medical fact with fantasy to produce a over twenty-seven international bestsellers, including Outbreak (1987), Terminal (1993), Contagion (1996), Chromosome 6 (1997) and Foreign Body (2008).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars did Cook really write this book, September 1, 2001

By 

Karen B. Nelson "Book addict" (Layton, Utah) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Shock (Hardcover)

I own and have read every one of Robin Cook's books, some several times. They are riveting, exciting and well written.
With Shock, I was in shock. Here are two female post grads from Harvard, no less, with newly acquired Doctorates in Economics and Microbiology. Then in comes Laverne & Shirley. How Cook expected to pass this off as a well written mystery beats me, the two girls giggled, argued, made a mockery out of average intelligence(to wit, the first and only day on the job, like no one noticed they took 1/2 hour breaks every hour, met at the water fountain and disappeared with no notice) and it was supposed to be a medical mystery. The only mystery is how he managed to keep a straight face as he wrote it. Would not recommend it at all. Unless you get it free or on loan, but remember, I told you so.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A tacky and deritative medical thriller without any thrills., September 16, 2001

By 

E. Bukowsky "booklover10" (NY United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Shock (Hardcover)

How low can he sink? Robin Cook's new medical thriller, "Shock," is shocking in only one respect. How can an author with Cook's reputation write a book so hackneyed, wooden and lacking in suspense as this one?

The protagonists are Joanna Meissner and Deborah Cochrane, two beautiful and brainy doctoral students. Yet, for all of their intellectual prowess, these two women see nothing fishy in an advertisement in the "Harvard Crimson" for egg donors. The ad offers forty-five thousand dollars to every egg donor that the clinic accepts.

Naively, the two women go to the Wingate Infertility Clinic, and they donate their eggs. They women take a glorious trip to Italy with their newfound wealth. Over a year later, they decide to look into the fate of their donated eggs by finding employment in the Wingate Clinic and doing some snooping. Joanna and Deborah predictably find out that the Wingate Clinic is engaged in some very questionable and unethical research. Will the ladies be able to get the authorities to help them before they are captured and killed by the nasties who run the clinic?

Joanna and Deborah are two of the most ridiculous sleuths that I have ever seen. They are like two overaged Nancy Drews, coming up with one presposterous plan after another. Their dialogue is stilted and silly and their behaviour is immature and inane. Deborah dresses like a hooker to avoid being recognized at the clinic and her ridiculous getup becomes a silly recurring joke. The book peters off at the end and Cook offers no real resolution to the asinine plot.

The premise of the book, namely that fertility clinics are the ideal setting for reproductive chicanery, has been done before many times. Cook breaks no new ground here. "Shock" is witless, dull and without any literary merit whatsover.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Get this guy an editor!, November 18, 2001

By 

Meg Brunner (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Shock (Hardcover)

Predictable medical thriller about two young women who agree to donate some of their eggs in return for a hefty sum (ostensibly to help infertile couples). Though they are nervous, the procedures go well and when they get their checks, they promptly take off for a year in Italy together. Happy go lucky. La la la.

During that year, though, they begin to get curious about whether or not their eggs ended up being viable. So, as soon as they return to the States, they put in a call to the clinic to ask if any of their eggs were successfully transplanted and turned into babies. As you'd expect, the clinic is completely unwilling to release this information. Completely contrary to what you'd expect (from two Harvard Ph.D.'s), the girls decide to commit about eight different felonies in order to steal that information for themselves. Okay, now, sure -- most women would love to know whether or not they are fertile before it comes time for them to actually start trying to have children. But how many of us would rob, steal, trespass, and commit fraud to find out? I mean, for Pete's sake.

Anyway, of course they end up finding out the clinic is actually up to no good. Human cloning and blah blah blah. I found it ironic that when they tell a doctor friend of theirs what the clinic is up to, he responds pretty nonchalantly to the whole story -- he's probably read this story a thousand times before too, huh? Pretty much the only TRULY interesting part of this book was when one of the clinic patients went into a dressing room named "Dorothy Stevens" (p. 57) and came out of it minutes later named "Dorothy Washburn" (p. 58). Gasp! What did those mad scientists DO to her in there? (...)