Fiction – Sometimes People Die by Simon Stephenson

Written by ex-doctor Simon Stephenson (who’s previous was speculative fiction ‘Set My Heart to Five’) this is a dry and darkly humorous tale of a disgraced, opiate-addict doctor on his last chance at a grotty east London hospital.

1999 – Returning to practice after a suspension for stealing opioids, a young Scottish doctor takes the only job he can find: senior house officer in struggling east London hospital St Luke’s. Amid the maelstrom of sick patients, over-worked staff and underfunded wards is a darker secret: too many patients are dying. Which of the medical professionals is behind the murders? And can we trust our narrator?

Oozing with exhaustion and weary knowledge, ‘Sometimes People Die’ is a story of overworked medics facing a daily parade of cases of gang violence, geriatric decline and human stupidity whilst not getting anything like enough sleep. Add into the mix a bolshy, celebrity drug addict, an enthusiastic, orthopaedic surgeon housemate, a pushy nurse and a porter nicknamed the Angel of Death, all at a hospital with a few too many unexplained deaths, and a junior doctor failing spectacularly to stay out of trouble. What ensues is a clever murder mystery, a wry look at human psychology and a quiet reminder that sometimes people die. Great stuff. – Ruth (Bookshop Manager)

‘In Stephenson, Vonnegut may have his first true protégé’ – Washington Post

Insightful on addiction and doctors’ lives, it reads almost like a comic medical memoir – with murder thrown in – The Bookseller

Non Fiction – And Finally by Henry Marsh

“As a neurosurgeon, I lived in a world filled with fear and suffering, death and cancer. But rarely, if ever, did I think about what it would be like if what I witnessed at work every day happened to me. This book is the story of how I became a patient myself.”

As a retired brain surgeon, Henry Marsh thought he understood illness, but he was unprepared for the impact of his diagnosis of advanced cancer. ‘And Finally’ explores what happens when someone who has spent a lifetime on the frontline of life and death finds himself contemplating what might be his own death sentence. As he navigates the bewildering transition from doctor to patient, he is haunted by past failures and projects yet to be completed, and frustrated by the inconveniences of illness and old age. But he is also more entranced than ever by the mysteries of science and the brain, the beauty of the natural world and his love for his family. 

Elegiac, candid, luminous and poignant, ‘And Finally’ is ultimately not so much a book about death, but a book about life and what matters in the end.

“In this superb meditation on life and death, Henry Marsh tackles the matter of mortality with all his trademark wit, wisdom, grace and humility… Unflinching, profound and deeply humane, And Finally is magnificent.” – Rachel Clarke, author of Dear Life