Sam Tryor is dead. He can’t remember how it happened, but he knows that he is dead. He discovers that he is a ghost and can follow his brother Nick; the detective in charge of his case, Walter Perry; and a reporter, Sarah Tilly. He was sure one of them would be able to find out what happened. He learns that he was the shooter in a pizza restaurant where 40 people died, not counting him, and twenty-one were wounded. Through the whole book Sam tries to find out what happened and why? He remembers growing up in Detroit and moving to Arizona. He learns that he sold double-wides and owned a trailer park. He found out he was holding a couple of guns for one of his tenants because the guy was on probation. Sam did not own any guns of his own. He follows the detective, his brother and the reporter for two days and gets a new insight into himself.

This book was very different in that it was written from the shooter’s point of view. I liked that, throughout the book, you learned about Sam’s character. It seemed there was no way this man could commit this crime. You saw Sam through his brother’s eyes and through the eyes of his neighbors, and then, through the impartial eyes of the detective on the case. You could not help liking Sam from things that were said about him but also feel disappointed in the way he handled things in the end. The cover was very appropriate since a lot of the book took place at the restaurant. This was a very good book, and I enjoyed the way it was written.

Kirkus Reviews is a biweekly magazine founded in 1933 that reviews books two to three months before the publication date. It is mostly read by people who order and purchase books for bookstores. 

“O’Meara, Alex

CHASING MEDICAL MIRACLES: The Promise and Perils of Clinical Trails

 A harsh, firsthand look at clinical research.

To cure his diabetes, freelance journalist O’Meara underwent an experimental pancreatic islet-cell transplant. The procedure didn’t work, and the experience inspired him to explore the subject. After admitting that trials have produced miracles from antibiotics to vaccines to pacemakers to CT scans, the author gets down to the business of recounting the disasters. He begins with two of the most frequently cited examples: the gruesome Nazi experiments on concentration-camp inmates and the shameful Tuskegee study in which nearly 400 syphilitic black men were left untreated so the clinicians could observe the effects of the disease. Moving to the present day, O’Meara describes studies in which subjects died, concentrating on the specific mechanics of each study. Readers who assume that the trials only occur at academic medical centers will be surprised by the author’s findings. As they multiply and grow wildly expensive—up to $500 million for a single drug—pharmaceutical companies are hiring clinical-research organizations, profit-making enterprises that recruit subjects, pay them and perform studies in their own facilities. These organizations continue to migrate overseas to save money and escape FDA oversight. The author looks at studies that cut corners and conceal bad results, and he profiles Americans who earn a living by participating and desperately poor foreigners who sign up under the false impression that they will receive free medical care. In the final chapters he concedes that most trials run uneventfully and produce positive results.

Despite the title, O’Meara passes lightly over the promises of clinical trials to emphasize the perils, but he does a capable job of revealing alarming problems that must be addressed.

(Agent: Joy Tutela/David Black Literary Agency)“