Christmas Babies by Christopher Keane and William D. Black (A book so derivative, it might put you in a COMA)

Happy Christmas dear readers. I’ve had this book on my shelf for years, but I thought a tale such as this should be read in December, and I’m not very organized. Despite the title, this second rate medical thriller has nothing to do with Christmas.

Dr. Heller is worried. All of his patients are miscarrying or giving birth to weird babies with green eyes and red hair. His boozehound of a wife gets a job investigating a politician who is trying to cut government restrictions on pharmaceutical companies. While this is happening the Doctor meets a sexy computer sales rep who also has green eyes and red hair. It did not take me long to figure out exactly where this was heading.

A few weeks ago, I read Robin Cook’s Coma, the book that started the “medical thriller” craze. It gets a write-up in Paperbacks From Hell, and while I was decently entertained by Coma, I thought it was one step too far removed from horror to include here. I didn’t actually notice it until I was halfway through Christmas Babies, but the blurb on the back compares it to Cook’s writing. I’ve heard that Cook’s other books, which I have no interest in reading, are extremely formulaic, and I imagine that Christmas Babies follows that formula pretty closely. This is basically the same book as Coma expect the people in comas are replaced with ginger babies. Honestly, thinking back, it’s shocking how similar the plots are – a medical anomaly, a web of lies, an assassin, a climax in a secret research facility…

Coma is a better book, but Christmas Babies has more scabby mutants. It’s a little bit trashier too. It was not the worst book I’ve read, and the last few chapters were relatively enjoyable, but in truth, this book is a pile of Christmas shit.

Ho, ho, ho! Have a good one!