Real Life Mysteries

**Disclaimer: what follows is a book review. Or, rather, two of them. The review is for general audiences. However, I am NOT saying the books are appropriate for all readers. Please use discernment!

I love murder mysteries. I love to read them and watch them on TV. I like to see if I can solve the mystery before the main character. Medical shows, police dramas, British TV, historical murder mysteries, medical thrillers, psychological thrillers. You name it, I like them!

But I tend to read them the way 1950s housewives ate bon bons! Too much and all at once. So every year, in August, I take a break and read only non-fiction. It is my annual Fiction Fast.

This year, though, I somehow ended up reading two real-life medical mysteries. The first was Dr. Ali S. Khan's The Next Pandemic: On the Frontlines Against the World's Greatest Dangers. The other was Morgue: A Life in Death by Dr. Vincent Di Maio.

The Next Pandemic was quite interesting, easy to read, and not (overly) graphic as it described diseases that can kill thousands. Dr. Khan has worked with others at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention for years, only recently leaving that post to take a professorship in Kansas. Over the course of 25 years, he has traveled the world to decipher how a disease started and how it can be contained. He worked on the first Ebola outbreaks in Africa, the SARS epidemic in South Asia, and the anthrax threat after 9/11.

Did you know that people in the Midwest catch wild prairie dogs to keep as pets? Did you also know those cute and furry creatures carry ticks that can jump to humans? Don't do it!

Morgue was actually what I would describe as a fun read. Dr. Di Maio is a world renowned medical examiner who began his career in Baltimore and then moved to Texas, where he worked at various posts. Now that he is retired he works as a consultant. For someone like me, who loves murder mysteries, this book was written with a fictional flavor, even though it was all true. Dr. Di Maio used each chapter to describe a case he worked, in such a way that I was tempted to figure it out myself. This book is not recommended for all audiences! It is graphic, in spots, and many of the cases are just plain disturbing. I won't go into them here.

Did you know coroners pronounce a person dead, and it is often an elected position. You can run for the election with no medical training whatsoever! But a medical examiner preforms the autopsy. Only a small percentage of autopsies are ruled homicide; any unattended death must have an autopsy.

My Fiction Fast is almost over, but I have one more I must finish before I return to the mind candy. I will fill you in on Nathaniel Philbrick's George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution in a few weeks!