Stephen Davison’s Kill & Cure ticks all of the medical thriller boxes. There is an “evil” company out to protect its research at all costs, a group of scientists putting themselves in harms way to outwit the company, and the man of the hour, in this case named David Stichell (called Stich), who rises up to outwit the inevitable police chase and find the truth.  This is, in the end, a decent but not exceptional thriller, but the surprises that Davison has managed to fit into his debut novel make the book a quick read and fun few hours.

Surprise number one is David Stichell himself.  He is not a top research scientist; he is a children’s chiropractor.  Just the fact that he is one step out of the research that lies at the centre of the thriller helps the novel move forward more quickly.  The explanations that Stichell receives don’t feel redundant because he needs them as much as the reader does.  It makes the invariable scientific conversations seem much more natural as the main character is coming at it with no experience. The science is not seamlessly woven in, (and without the excuse of Stich’s ignorance, would seem heavy-handed indeed) but it isn’t too obscure – the usual genetic manipulation of seemingly perfect medicine.

Stich has a family to protect: a fiancee, Susan (the actual top scientist), and a daughter, Alice. When the book begins, a murder is committed that seems completely unconnected to Stich or his family, until it becomes clear that his fiancee is becoming involved with the same study that may have gotten other scientists killed. Soon, Stich is desperate to figure out what is going in order to protect those he loves. As the questions proliferate, Stich must move quickly to understand where the true threats hide. Susan, though, may be operating on her own agenda and keeping secrets that could get everyone killed.

Davison does an excellent job portraying Stich as an ordinary man caught up in extraordinary events. He is rarely in complete possesion of the facts, and he is often operating on less than complete information.  This style works well to make Stich a sort of everyman – instead of the super-intelligent, super-lucky, and super-skilled protagonists that inhabit many thrillers. That said, the writing in Kill & Cure does feel like a debut novel.  However, it is tightly edited and there are elements in the plot that put it a step above a typical medical thriller. Stich’s profession is not the only surprise in the novel, and it is those surprises that really make it worth the read. So much so, that to give any of the plot away in a review feels like spoiling some of the best bits of the novel. It’s a solid entry into the medical thriller genre, and it would be worth looking out for anything Davison writes next.

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