Interview with medical thriller author John Bishop MD

Today’s special guest author is John Bishop MD. He’s chatting with me about his medical thriller, Act of Murder (A Doc Brady Mystery).

Bio:

John Bishop MD is the author of Act of Murder: A Doc Brady Mystery. Dr. Bishop has practiced orthopedic surgery in Houston, Texas, for 30 years. His Doc Brady medical thriller series is set in the changing environment of medicine in the 1990s. Drawing on his years of experience as a practicing surgeon, Bishop entertains readers using his unique insights into the medical world with all its challenges, intricacies, and complexities, while at the same time revealing the compassion and dedication of health care professionals. Dr. Bishop and his wife, Joan, reside in the Texas Hill Country.

Welcome, John. Please tell us about your current release.

Act of Murder is a medical mystery novel centered around Dr. Jim Bob Brady, an orthopedic surgeon in Houston, Texas. He witnesses his neighbor's ten-year-old son, who has Osteogenesis Imperfecta, killed by a hit-and-run driver. Was this an accident, or an Act of Murder? After the child's death, he enlists his son J.J. and his wife Mary Louise in chasing down clues from another child with the same bone disease that take them deeper and deeper into a Houston that Brady didn't know existed. They discover a macabre conspiracy stretching from the largest teaching hospital in Texas, to the upper reaches of Houston's legal community, to the shores of Galveston Bay. Soon Doc Brady realizes that the old adage remains true: The love of money is the root of all evil.

What inspired you to write this book?

I was inspired to write this book for a number of reasons. First, an old friend lost a child, and the grief around that issue was quite intense. I wanted to somehow put into words the emotions that surround that sort of cataclysmic event. At the same time, I had ended a long-lasting teaching position, and was concentrating on my medical practice only, without the teaching, or the presentations required at national meetings, or the articles that required publishing as a part of being a Professor. I found I had...gasp...free time. I had always enjoyed the writing of medical articles, but not the politics of academic medicine. So, instead of sitting down at my desk, and starting an article on the Effects of Hydroxyapatite Synthetic Bone Graft on Acetabular Insufficiency, I sat down and wrote the title, Act of Murder, and took it from there. It was like a faucet was turned on inside of me, and I just couldn't quit writing. What a feeling!

What exciting story are you working on next?

I have two other Doc Brady books coming out. The next, Act of Deception, releases June 10th. In this novel, Brady gets sued for medical malpractice when a patient whose knee he replaced ends up losing the leg to an amputation. Brady is convinced he did nothing wrong. Did he somehow commit malpractice, and this is all his fault, or is this an Act of Deception. The next book is Act of Revenge, and releases September 10th. Doc Brady is involved in a ski accident on the slopes in Aspen, and befriends the victim who happens to be a plastic surgeon in Houston. The plastic surgeon is later seen on national television threatening the President of the Insurance Company who has recently cancelled the doctor's malpractice insurance. The next day, the executive is found dead. Is this a suicide, or an Act of Revenge?

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

I guess I first considered myself a writer when I wrote Act of Murder, back in 1994 or so. The book wasn't published at the time, but I had the "juice" so I kept writing. I completed two additional novels after Act of Deception and Act of Revenge, Act of Negligence and Act of Fate. Now that the first three books are being published, I've gone back to writing about Doc Brady, and hopefully I'll see all of them in print. I've completed two new novels, and am working on the third, which would be the eighth in the series.

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I can't say that I write full time, although I am retired from my Orthopedic Surgery practice. I still play the piano, which has kept me somewhat sane all these years, and I am an avid golfer. So now I divide my time between my three hobbies, and juggle my daily schedule to accommodate all three.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

I'm not sure this is a quirk, but I generally do not create an outline of the novel prior to writing. I mull around an idea in my head, think of a title that would fit well with "Act of,” sit down, and start typing. Sometimes the story line will flow, sometimes I back myself into a corner and have to work my way out by either changing my tack on a subject, or by creating a complete fabrication that is believable. That's the fun of writing. You don't like a character that you've created? Bam! They're gone! Too bad, so sad.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I grew up an only child in a very small town outside Waco, Texas, of very modest means. My mother was oldest of eight children, my dad the youngest of nine children. They grew up in the Depression, without an opportunity for college, so I was the first in the entire family to achieve that. Growing up my only real aspiration was to get out of town, and make my own life. I stumbled across the idea of going to medical school when I was a sophomore in college, when we used to sit around the dorm and watch the broadcast of lottery numbers of draftees for the Viet Nam War. As I remember, you had three guaranteed deferments back then: medical school, divinity school, or marriage. It was an easy choice for a kid making extra money by playing music. I didn't mind the idea of serving my country, I just wanted to serve when the timing was best for me. As it turned out, when I did get drafted, towards the end of medical school, the military discovered I had Rheumatic Fever with a heart murmur when I was twelve, and classified me as 4-F. All that worry for nothing.

Links:

Website | Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Thanks for being here today!

Interview with thriller author Daniel Welch

Author Daniel Welch joins me today to chat about his new medical-business thriller, Race for the Mind.

Bio:

Dan has spent his entire career in the pharmaceutical business - decades of experience in multi-national pharmaceutical companies and smaller, US-based biotech companies. He has had a leadership role in the development and launch of several “blockbuster” medicines; some the most prescribed in the world and others, breakthrough medicines for life threatening diseases. Dan also worked in venture capital and private equity firms; essential sources of capital for developing new companies and medicines.

His experience leading over a dozen successful biotech companies includes roles as CEO, Chairman of the Board, Board Director and advisor.

Dan travels the world, loves his wife of 40 years, his two adult sons, fly fishing, ice hockey and everything about wine. He makes his home in California and Colorado.

Welcome, Dan. Please tell us about your current release.

The stakes for the Race for the Mind Couldn’t be higher

·      About 50 million people in the world have Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and by 2050 there will be well over 100 million.

·      The annual cost to care for Americans with AD is projected to be $1.1 trillion in 2050; 1 in 3 dollars spent by Medicare.

·      A patient is diagnosed with AD every 66 seconds – by 2050, every 33 seconds.

·      AD kills more Americans than cancers of the breast and prostate – combined.

Race for the Mind is a story about this enormous socioeconomic challenge and how the medical community and the high-risk, complex and controversial world of the pharmaceutical industry take it on. Race for the Mind describes the terrible odds, horrendous sums of money, the stunningly long drug development process and the courageous and dedicated men and women who devote their entire lives to helping millions of people they will never meet, live a longer and better life. The pressure and enormous stakes of the Race for the Mind expose the most noble and misguided aspects of our humanity.

Dr. Darya Rostov, one of the greatest minds of a generation is stricken with Alzheimer’s disease and she represents the 50 million people who are currently making their long journey into the night. Jack Callahan is the CEO of BioNeura, a San Francisco biotech company developing what could be the first breakthrough for patients like Darya. Dr. Nathaniel Shah, a brilliant neurologist rises to run SNS, a rival company based in Geneva, Switzerland and hides a terrifying secret. The plot tracks Callahan and Shah, each driven by very different things, their struggle within themselves and with each other. It should be all about the patients like Darya – but alas, we are human - and that sometimes gets in the way.

What inspired you to write this book?

I wrote Race for the Mind for two reasons. First, I have spent 40 years in the business of making medicines and during this time, I was often frustrated by how poorly and one-sidedly the pharmaceutical industry was treated by the media. I thought – perhaps naively hoped – that I could tell an engaging story and while telling it, stealthily educate the general public about another way the industry could be portrayed. That other side of the story would be the one of terrible odds, horrendous sums of money and the stunningly long drug development process and also, of the courageous and dedicated men and women who devote their entire lives to helping people they have never met live a longer and a better quality life. Second, my family like so many other families has been visited several times by Alzheimer’s disease and I wanted to bring attention to and raise money to address the urgent need to race for a cure.

Excerpt from Race for the Mind:

Dr. Bonner reviewed Darya Rostov’s file before he called her into his office. As he looked at her imaging test results, he could detect the telltale path of destruction of AD and imagined what her brain must look like. The damage he saw reminded him of aerial photos of Germany during the high-intensity bombing the Allies employed to break the back of Hitler’s war factories. The diseased section of Dr. Rostov’s brain looked like the dark sections of North Korea. There was no industry there. No commerce. No communication. No life. On the other hand, the healthy sections of her brain yet untouched by the ballistics of the disease were still bustling with life and purpose.

      He imagined zooming in on just one of the millions of microscopic clusters in Dr. Rostov’s brain, one holding memories of her life, another her accumulated knowledge, yet another the building blocks of her personality. He recalled from as far back as his first visit with her the joy that came to her face whenever she spoke about her father. Now Dr. Bonner imagined peering into a cluster of neurons that might contain Dr. Rostov’s memories of a living room in which a scene was unfolding— a scene holding the memory of Darya’s father - his voice, his possessions and the sweet aroma of his pipe tobacco. Darya loved her father for encouraging her intellect and her unorthodox pursuit of a mathematics career in an age when her peers were expected to pursue a husband. Her father was so proud of his Darya and she glowed in the pride that he shined on her.

      As Dr. Bonner imagined the warmth and comfort of this scene, it suddenly went black. The disease had vaporized the microscopic living room and everything in it.

      He truly hated this disease - the Grim Reaper’s colder and much crueler brother, the one who takes the essence of a life well before he actually takes the life—and leaves the un-dead shell of the person behind, unable to care for itself.

What exciting story are you working on next?

I am excited about the future of gene therapy – replacing missing genes whose absence is causing terrible diseases or “editing” faulty genes that cause disease and making the faulty genes normal, functioning genes. Gene therapy will revolutionize medicine in the next 5-10 years. A medical thriller that brings a reader into this exciting new world would be fin to write as gene therapy is fraught with medical, ethical, social and economic issues that create a rich palette with which to paint a compelling and interesting story.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

In my business career I wrote a lot and considered myself a solid business writer. I only considered myself a writer when I began to get positive feedback on my book and learned that I could move people to emotion: tears; anger and hope.

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

When a book is under construction, about 20 hours a month – I write in my “spare time” while working.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

I travelled a lot while I was writing Race for the Mind – so I wrote a lot of the book on airplanes.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

A professional ice hockey player or international spy.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

100% of the profits from books sales will be donated to Alzheimer's care, support and research.

Getting my message out motivated me in writing Race for the Mind - why it takes so long, why the risks are ridiculously high, why it costs billions of dollars to bring a medicine from the laboratory to the pharmacy and let people know that there are thousands of selfless, passionate and brilliant people in drug companies who are dedicating their lives to help patients who they will never meet.

Links:

Website | Amazon

Thanks for joining me today, Dan!

Interview with thriller author K.V. Scruggs

Thriller author K.V. Scruggs joins me today to talk about her new medical thriller, What They Don’t Know.

Bio:

K.V. Scruggs is an internal medicine physician, blogger, and novelist. 

She is an alumna of Clemson University and received her MD from the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. She completed her residency in Internal Medicine at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. She is currently working as a hospitalist and lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with her husband, two sons, and ornery cat, Jules.

She enjoys writing about current medical issues and uses her blog as a platform to educate patients and their families. She is also a regular contributor to The Huffington Post.

In her fiction writing, Dr. Scruggs not only draws from her experience as a physician, but as a wife, friend and mother. What They Don’t Know is her first novel.

Welcome, K.V. Please tell us about your current release.

What They Don’t Know is part thriller, part cautionary tale. It’s about what could happen if control over healthcare decisions gets put in the wrong hands, if people who are strictly financially motivated start calling the shots. In some ways this has already happened, so it doesn’t take too much imagination to picture it playing out that way. The story just takes it to another, terrifying level.

What inspired you to write this book?

I work as a physician in the hospital. Oftentimes, I think of crazy “what-if” scenarios, and some of them develop into an entire story line. The crazier, yet most believable, the better. I mostly write for entertainment, but I also really care about the direction healthcare is going, and I think that comes across in my writing. I have seen themes come out in my fiction writing that I didn’t necessarily intend to write about but certainly agree with. For example, electronic healthcare records are not the end-all be-all of providing exceptional, efficient medical care. You still need a conscientious and qualified professional on the other side of the computer. Another main theme of the novel is that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. When you read the book you’ll understand what I mean by that!

You can read an excerpt from What They Don’t Know here.

What exciting story are you working on next?

I have some ideas about a sequel to What They Don’t Know, and I’ve started plotting out the storyline. I am also working on a psychological/domestic thriller. It’s a story about a preteen boy whose younger sister is murdered in Smalltown, USA.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

I always loved reading and writing growing up, but during medical school and residency I wasn’t able to do much in the way of hobbies. Once I was established in my career, I started writing. I just sat down to write one day and my journal entry became a short story, which ultimately became a novel. That was in 2011. I started What They Don’t Know, my second full-length (but first published) novel in 2014 when my oldest son was one.

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

No, I also work as a hospitalist physician (an Internal Medicine doctor that takes care of people admitted to the hospital). When I’m actively writing or editing, I try to commit to 1000 words (or a certain number of pages, if editing) a day. If I don’t get to it in the morning or throughout the day, then I know it has to get done before my head hits the pillow. For someone who loves to relax before bed, it’s a great motivator! There are some days it just doesn’t get done, but I am usually happy with 5 or 6 days a week, especially since it usually averages 7000+ words a week.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

Well, I sit in the same spot on my couch to write pretty much all the time. It’s hard to think creatively if I’m not in that one spot. I have several spots around my house designed to be perfect writing havens, but I always seem to go back to the couch.

I would also say I get my best writing done when the pressure’s off. Sometimes sitting down at the beginning of the 1000 words is super intimidating, but once I’ve hit 1000, or at least hit my stride, it’s much easier to continue. Probably for that reason, I also find it easier to pick up where I’ve left off if I stop writing mid-scene. The next day, the writing just flows naturally since I already know what’s going to happen next.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

A scuba diver. And a writer, that was definitely a dream of mine.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

It has been a dream come true to publish this novel and have people read it. Truly, it is such a privilege. So I just want to thank everyone out there for reading and continuing to support the writing community.

Links:

Website | Facebook | Goodreads | Twitter | Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Thanks for being here today, K.V.

Interview with thriller author Carrie Rubin

I’m interviewing Carrie Rubin today about her newest novel, a psychological medical thriller titled Eating Bull.

Bio:

Carrie Rubin is a physician with a master’s degree in public health. She is a member of the International Thriller Writers association. Her novels include Eating Bull and The Seneca Scourge. She lives in Ohio with her husband and two sons.

Welcome, Carrie. Please tell us about your current release.

In Eating Bull, Jeremy, a lonely and obese teenager, shoots into the limelight when a headstrong public health nurse persuades him to sue the food industry. Tossed into a storm of media buzz and bullying, the teen draws the attention of a serial killer who’s targeting the obese. Soon the boy, the nurse, and their loved ones take center stage in a delusional man’s drama. 

Through fiction, Eating Bull explores the real-life issues of bullying, fat-shaming, food addiction, and the food industry’s role in obesity. 

What inspired you to write this book?

Three things really:

·      The challenges people face to lose weight—so many obstacles block their success, the food industry among them.

·      Reading investigative reporter Michael Moss’s book Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us. It’s an eye-opening exposé on the role of the food industry in our country’s weight problem.

·      A tearful, severely overweight teenage patient who said to me, “Not a day goes by I don’t know I’m fat, because no one will let me forget it.”

What exciting story are you working on next?

I’m working on another medical thriller. No social theme this time around, but it does have a hint of the supernatural. There are a lot of medical thrillers out there, so I try to add a twist or a different element to change things up.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

Great question, and one all writers struggle with. I started my first book in 2001, and I didn’t call myself a writer even after it was published in 2012. In fact, it’s only been in the last year with the release of my second novel that I’ve allowed the word to slip off my tongue when people ask. In my own mind I’ve fully accepted the moniker, but it’s still difficult to call myself that around others. It sounds pretentious somehow. But I’m trying to embrace it!

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

During a transition from clinical to non-clinical medicine a couple years ago, I detoured into writing full-time, at least for now. I would like to say the entire day is devoted to working on my novels, but as any writer knows, much of our time is spent in promotional and networking activities, including writing blog posts and checking into social media. And of course there are family and home responsibilities, as well as continuing medical and public health certification requirements.

I don’t really have a set schedule, but I do have a rule that if I haven’t accomplished much writing during the day, I write in the evening instead. That way I’m sure to make daily progress, even if it means a long workday.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

Hmm, I suppose that might be writing on my treadmill. I don’t like sitting for long periods, so I have a plastic shelf mounted on my treadmill. It’s designed to support a laptop. That way I can write while I walk at a slow pace. I feel more creative (extra blood flow to the brain maybe?), and I get a lot of steps in too!

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

The first thing I remember wanting to be was a librarian. I then went through the usual childhood list: teacher, lawyer, veterinarian, police officer, doctor. The last one stuck. Of course, given my love of books and writing, the librarian aspiration wasn’t far off. So I guess I came full circle.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

I’ll share something I’ve finally allowed myself to do: let go of books that don’t hold my interest. I used to think I had to finish every book. But life is too short and our reading lists too long to do that. So if a book isn’t your cup of tea, move on. There will always be another one waiting.

Thank you so much for having me on your blog today, Lisa! I enjoyed our exchange, and it was a pleasure to be here.

Links:

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Amazon

Thanks for being here today, Carrie!