Death Benefit
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4.1 • 25 Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
An “exciting” (St. Louis Post-Dispatch) novel of unchecked greed, medical malfeasance, and startling science, from the #1 bestselling “master of the medical thriller” (The New York Times)
“An intense read that raises thought-provoking questions.”—Associated Press
Pia Grazdani is an exceptional yet aloof medical student working closely with Columbia University Medical Center’s premier scientist on cutting-edge research that could revolutionize health care by creating replacement organs for critically ill patients. But when tragedy strikes in the lab, Pia, with the help of classmate George Wilson, launches an investigation into the unforeseen calamity in the hospital’s supposedly secure biosafety lab.
Meanwhile, two ex-Wall Street whiz-kids think they’ve found another loadstone in the nation’s multitrillion-dollar life insurance industry, and race to find ways to control actuarial data and securitize the policies of the aged and infirm to make another killing.
As Pia and George dig deeper into the events at the lab, one question remains unanswered: Is someone attempting to manipulate private insurance information to allow investors to benefit from the deaths of others?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this formulaic medical thriller from bestseller Cook (Coma), Pia Grazdani, a 26-year-old Columbia Medical School student who's overcome a difficult childhood to emerge as a brilliant, beautiful, if still troubled adult, attracts the interest of Nobel Prize winning molecular geneticist Tobias Rothman. Rothman, who has worked with virulent strains of typhoid-causing salmonella, is focusing on a revolutionary program of growing entire organs from stem cells. Meanwhile, greedy Edmund Mathews, the chairman of LifeDeals Inc., is using the company to buy up life insurance policies cheaply based on current actuarial data. Facing devastating financial losses if organ transplants were to become much cheaper, Mathews and his partners scheme to end the threat posed by Rothman's organogenesis work. Grazdani ends up squarely in the villains' crosshairs, but fortunately, smitten fellow Columbia med student George Wilson is there for support. Cook's deft handling of medical science helps lift an otherwise pedestrian plot.
