Provocative, heartbreaking, and darkly humorous, Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures introduces readers to a masterful new voice in fiction. A practicing ER physician, Vincent Lam delivers a precise and intimate portrait of the medical profession in his fiction debut. These twelve interwoven stories follow a group of young doctors as they move from the challenges of medical school to the intense world of emergency rooms, evacuation missions, and terrifying new viruses. Winner of the prestigious Giller Prize, Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures marks the arrival of a deeply humane and preternaturally gifted writer.
Fitz, Ming, Chen, and Sri are the four ambitious protagonists of Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures. They fall in love as they study for their exams, face moral dilemmas as they split open cadavers, confront police who rough up their patients, and treat schizophrenics with pathologies similar to their own. In one harrowing story set amidst the 2003 SARS crisis, which the author witnessed firsthand, two of these doctors suddenly become the patients.
Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures invites us into a world where the ordinary becomes the critical in a matter of seconds. A formidable debut, it is a profound and unforgettable depiction of today’s doctors, patients, and hospitals.
BLOODLETTING & MIRACULOUS CURES
Vincent Lam illuminates where strength and resilience reside when body and soul are tested by illness. This artfully crafted, deeply moving, and profoundly intelligent book is a remarkable debut of a new voice in medical literature.”
What makes “Bloodletting” so remarkable is its depth…. Lam entertains and educates with fluidity and style, and that just might be a miraculous cure of the literary kind.”
This lovely book breaks ground on several fronts…Presumably much of the book is, in fact, memoir, but the joints between the imagined and the recalled are seamless, and the fiction does its job of turning mirror into magnifying glass.”
These memorable stories course with humanity and emotion.”
The stories’ quiet strength lies not in the doctors’ education but in Lam’s portrayal of the flawed humans behind the surgical masks.”
A searing, perfectly paced set of linked stories that explores the careers and relationships of four Toronto doctors…Tender insight into the fascinating emotional and social implications of a career that is, inherently, so much more than a job.”
Vincent Lam’s book is amazing, beautiful, and painful. I cannot believe that a writer can emerge, so fully-formed and incisive, with his first book. This guy is a star.”
