The Deadly Dinner Party: and Other Medical Detective Stories,   ISBN:9780300125580

Customer Rating: 

This is a wonderfully written collection of medical mysteries. The cases are told as real-life stories, and I felt as if I was a part of the detective work which brought us back to the garlic bread or wet loofah. As a doctor, I find the cases are both gripping and educational. I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in medical thrillers or if you want to see how doctors think about complex cases.

Customer Rating: 

As a physician and epidemiologist, who was pulled into the field by Berton Roueche's fantastic Medical Detectives articles, I am glad to say that Dr. Edlow has put together a collection of stories that carry the theme forward to today in a manner that is entertaining, witty, thorough, and educational. A superb book, and I recommend it highly!

Customer Rating: 

I read this book quite by chance on a transatlantic flight and was glad I did. I was bringing the book back to Italy for a friend, a doctor, who bought it in the US and forgot it while visiting. While on the flight for the first leg from Boston to Amsterdam I decided to read it and after reading about a third of it was disappointed when the plane finally landed. I read more on the flight from Amsterdam to Florence, and finished it in my apartment later that same day, in spite of having to unpack and get ready for work the next day.

Each story is easy to read, with a mix of detective work, explainable science, and in many cases enough about the human condition to make it amusing. Dr. Edlow writes it as if spinning a yarn sitting across from you in an Enoteca, giving descriptions of patients physical characteristics, quotes from the patient, family, and friends as well as explaining the working hypothesis of the investigators trying to solve each medical mystery. It also gave me a new appreciation for those medical sleuths that work attempting to solve the problems of infectious disease at places like the Center for Disease Control.

I ended up ordering my own edition of the book for my wife to read as well as one of Edlow's other books, "Bullseye"

Customer Rating: 

Dr. Edlow is tenaciously honest and accurate in his communication of medical concepts and the limitations of medical knowledge; and he does so in a language everyone can understand. So approachable are Dr. Edlow's stories, that they are able to immerse their readers in a world of disease and investigation as if they were directly involved. He accomplishes this feat by wrapping each story in fascinating historical detail and everyday environments and foods many will have experienced. You may never attend a dinner party, pet your cat, admire Queen Elizabeth's crown jewels, or read Harry Potter in the same way again.

As a physician and a lover of well-written literature, I can wholeheartedly recommend this book to the lay person and medical professional alike.

Customer Rating: 

If you like the sort of articles that Berton Roueché used to publish in the New Yorker and collected in books like Medical Detectives then you'll be sure to enjoy this. This is pretty much an homage to the master but interesting nonetheless.