The Waiting Rooms
Eve Smith
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars
4.00
· 10 ratings · 379 pages · Published: 14 Apr 2020
'Combines the excitement of a medical thriller À la Michael Crichton with sensitive characterisation and social insight in a timely debut novel all the more remarkable for being conceived and written before the current pandemic' Guardian
'STUNNING and terrifying ... The Waiting Rooms wrenches your heart in every way possible, but written with such humanity and emotion' Miranda Dickinson
'Chillingly close to reality, this gripping thriller brims with authenticity ... a captivating, accomplished and timely debut from an author to watch' Adam Hamdy
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Decades of spiralling drug resistance have unleashed a global antibiotic crisis. Ordinary infections are untreatable, and a scratch from a pet can kill. A sacrifice is required to keep the majority safe: no one over seventy is allowed new antibiotics. The elderly are sent to hospitals nicknamed 'The Waiting Rooms' ... hospitals where no one ever gets well.
Twenty years after the crisis takes hold, Kate begins a search for her birth mother, armed only with her name and her age. As Kate unearths disturbing facts about her mother's past, she puts her family in danger and risks losing everything. Because Kate is not the only secret that her mother is hiding. Someone else is looking for her, too.
Sweeping from an all-too-real modern Britain to a pre-crisis South Africa, The Waiting Rooms is epic in scope, richly populated with unforgettable characters, and a tense, haunting vision of a future that is only a few mutations away.
Tagged as:
- dystopia 3
- medical horror 3
- apocalyptic 3
- post-apocalyptic 3
- contemporary 2
- family 2
- mystery 2
- angst 2
- domestic drama 1
- drama 1
- Add topics
- format - reader age
- audiobook 2
- book 1
- adult fiction 1
- content warnings
- death / grief 1