Isabel
Leon, television reality star, is dead. Her body, washed up on Key West beach,
is discovered by a toddler. Two ambulances arrive simultaneously, when she has
been gone for seven minutes. One set of EMTs do their best to resuscitate her,
but twenty-one minutes dead, they give up and call her death. The other EMTs
are waiting nearby and agree to take the body to the morgue.
But
once the second group has Isabel’s body in their ambulance, things begin to happen.
Dr. Horatio Quinn presses a button and the doctored (no pun intended) ambulance
begins to turn into a small laboratory. Using X101, an experimental drug not
approved by the FDA and developed by Quinn, is administered along with a set of
complicated other medical interventions.
Soon
Isabel is alive. Although she suffers from fatigue, as is expected, there is no
brain damage. The medical team who saved her operates outside the law. The
Network, as it is called, can change the world.
But
Isabel faces a major hurdle. She recently “sold” her life insurance to save her
mother from breast cancer. She herself, a high risk, underwent a double mastectomy
to avoid the cancer from developing in her. Now that she will probably live a
long and healthy life, her broker is furious. It will take too many years for
him to collect, and he wants, no needs, the money now.
The
story begins at the end, with Isabel’s death and continues that way for a while.
Readers get a chance to see the backstory so that when the narrative shifts
from past to present, the transition is seamless. That’s tricky thing to pull off,
but Piekoff does it masterfully. The story grabbed me from the first sentence
(1 minute dead.). In addition to her “benefactor”, there are people who want to
get their hands on the X101 and will get rid of anything and anyone who is in
the way. A great thrill ride that I give 5 out of 5 stars.
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