Beat the Reaper: Josh Bazell

Publishers are given to attempts to whip up excitement about debut novels (it's their job, after all), and often such fireworks splutter out all too quickly. But that's not going to happen with Josh Bazell's debut thriller Beat the Reaper, which is (it has to be said) quite as impressive as his publishers are trumpeting - in fact, if this book doesn't take the crime and thriller world by storm, there's no justice. What marks the book out from the rest of an increasingly overcrowded field is its vibrant, glittering prose - streaked through with a mordant wit (highlighted by a series of pithy - and highly entertaining - footnotes; an unusual element in the thriller genre)
The plot is highly original. Peter Brown is a young Manhattan intern who is not all he seems to be. He has a past - and as any reader of crime novels knows - the past never stays buried for long. Peter has had an edgy run-in with a mugger and a more congenial elevator one-to-one with a female pharmaceutics rep. But his most significant encounter is to be with a new hospital patient, Nicholas LoBrutto - a man who knows the truth behind Peter's artificially contrived facade: the young intern is, in fact, in the Witness Protection program, and he remains in the gunsights of some unpleasant New Jersey heavies. And things are about to get very hot for both Peter and LoBrutto. Josh Bazell, as Beat the Reaper, demonstrates, is the real deal, and the auguries for this debut are very good. If he can just sustain this level of invention and energy thoughout that difficult second novel…