Side Effects

Despite a slow start and an awkward narrative device, this medical thriller does take off, maintaining a fast pace until its satisfying denouement. Tired of the slow burn of emergency medicine at New York General, Dr. Kate Martin eagerly accepts pharmaceutical company Randall Webber's offer to become its medical consultant for the launch of Genelife, a miraculous new drug capable of turning back the clock. Using the small medicated patch herself, Kate becomes the official spokesperson for the drug until she begins to notice some serious side effects and questions both Genelife's ingredients and the consequences of its long-term use. Kate teams up with Steve Kavett, an anthropologist whose brother-in-law originally developed Genelife and has since disappeared. The two soon uncover a corporate conspiracy ranging from Connecticut to Florida to Switzerland and explosive evidence that Genelife is not what it seems. Realistic in both scope and description, Fisher has created likable characters and thrown in just the right amount of anthropology, biomedicine, ecology, pharmacology, romance and intrigue. Though there are a few inconsistencies, more troubling is Fisher's use of multiple narrators, a strategy which undermines the plot and stoops to the ridiculous when even Kate's dog is given a point of view. (Aug.)