Flawless

by Joshua Spanogle

Book Overview

A former medical detective for the Centers for Disease Control, Dr. Nate McCormick had seen enough suffering to last a lifetime. Now he's left the CDC, determined to begin a new life with his... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385338546
• ISBN13: 9780385338547
• Release Date: August 2007
• Publisher: Delacorte Press
• Length: 481 Pages
• Weight: 1.26 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.4" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Excellent second novel

I'm not usually a fan of medical thrillers, but gave Joshua Spanogle's Isolation Ward a try and was glad I did. This guy can write! Hero Nate McCormick is a great flawed protagonist with a unique voice and someone who is easy to identify with. In Flawless, McCormick is back and Spanogle has managed to avoid the sophomore curse, returning with a novel just as good (if not better) than his first. Nate has relocated to the West Coast to pursue a relationship with the girlfriend he reconnected with during his initial case (chronicled in Ward). He's jobless and hasn't found an apartment and his aimless state has started to wear on the burgeoning relationship. Into this state of things comes an old friend from his student days who wants Nate's help with something. But before Nate can find out what it is, his friend Murph is murdered, along with his wife and two children, plunging Nate into a complicated mystery swirling around a biotech company in the South San Francisco hills, coupled with Chinese gangsters and a series of photographs of women and men, faces disfigured by an agressive facial cancer. Nate is warned off, his girlfriend is attacked, and several of the people in the photographs are killed in a variety of shocking ways, but McCormick just can't give up, feeling he owes something to the friend he lost track of. This is an excellent, fast-moving novel with three-dimensional, believable characters. Nate suffers for his investigation and his feelings of rage and helplessness are palpable. And his life continues to develop on the sidelines, in the manner of the best current detective fiction. Spanogle is a truly talented writer and I'm very much looking forward to his next novel. Flawless is very highly recommended!

I whole-heartedly recommend Flawless

Nirvana's "Heart Shaped Box" has a line, "I wish I could eat your cancer when you turn black." The song could easily be on the soundtrack for Flawless, a smart, lyrical, tremendously entertaining, hard-to-second guess novel by a gifted writer who really makes it all feel effortless. The dark, wry tone perfectly colors the novel's protagonist, who is brilliant, outside the law, morally relativistic, both sober and drunk, and quite flawed, if you will. His immersion into an extraordinarily well-drawn world of technology, moneyed medicine, and the seductive pulchritude of the San Francisco Bay area is a potent concoction, and I enjoyed every turn of the flawless page. Spanogle's plotting and character development are spot-on as is the novel's inevitable descent into a brutal underbelly of beauty. It's a fine thriller, and have heard Michael Crichton mentioned as a comparison, which is valid, but there's a spirit of Dostoevsky in Spanogle's words, and despite the bleak wit, a surprisingly tender heart.

Made me look in the mirror VERY differently

I've read "Isolation Ward" and will say "Flawless" is tighter, tougher and more topical. It's like a Chandler-horror version of Nip/Tuck. What I liked most about Spanogle's style is that, like Crichton, you feel like you're learning something along the way -- it's not a complete police procedural, and there's surprising heart. A beautiful female newscaster ends up with a decaying face and the scene between Nate and her has genuinely stayed with me. Plus, this time round, Nate (who has enough dings in his character to make him human) gets out of the biotech scene more and into San Francisco, which I liked. Spanogle is bent on not boring you and I appreciate that.

Surprisingly good thriller with character

I read his previous book, and was a little annoyed by the main character's persona, but "Nate" and every other part of the book was very much improved. Easily the best book I have read this year. Deep and well developed... more believable and not a plot that you can figure out quickly. I highly recommend the audiobook on CD or at [...]... Scott Brick really brings this book to life.

TAUT, TENSE, THRILL-PACKED READING

If you want a voice performer who can deliver terse, edgy lines that keep you listening and can sustain suspense with well chosen pauses, look for Scott Brick's name on an audio book. That's not news as he seems to be sought after by almost every audio publisher, and has been named Narrator of the Year. His take on protagonist Nate McCormick is perfection as Nate sometimes spouts off unwisely or verbally flagellates himself because he can't put the pieces of this crime/medical puzzle together fast enough. Once a detective for the Centers for Disease Control, Nate has decided to turn his life around with a new job, new location and, of course, the beautiful Brooke. But, at the outset there's trouble beginning with a a heated argument then the murder of an old friend and the discovery of shocking photographs - pictures of the horribly disfigured, women with their faces covered with tumors. As if this suffering were not enough, it soon becomes obvious that these same women are being murdered in an effort to cover up the devastating effects of a cosmetic drug. We learned with Isolation Ward that medical student Joshua Spanogle knows his territory well, and he mines it again with chilling results in this story of the havoc wrought when organized crime and medicine partner. - Gail Cooke