Cynically Sweet (Booklikes)

Crescent by Daniel Wallock is about George Ash, a premier heart surgeon. This book is about George dealing with a patient, Rachel Crescent, and also his dealings with a client of a suicide hotline that he volunteers for.

George doesn't seem particularly interesting. His life is kind of dull. Though George obviously must be really smart, being a heart surgeon, I think that the author places too much emphasis on his intelligences. It just seems like he's setting the character up for failure, especially considering the outcome of the story; it makes him look a little bit stupid after the author has tried to do his best trying to make George look smart. Furthermore, George seemed to be kind of creepy in some places. For example, his presence in Rachel's room. He essentially sits in her room for a long time, without a good reason for being there. Sure, if he were there for legitimate doctor business, it might be a little more believable. However, he's just sitting there and writing notes on his stories. His interest in her seems just silly because he's only known her a short time and he has no real reason to spend time with her like that. It just seems really awkward and creepy. As for the suicide hotline, It just seemed like he cared very little about the outcome of the patient. He had little interest in trying to keep Brian alive and I don't feel like he did his best in trying to help Brian; he just seemed like he had a miserable attitude and that he was trying to further upset the guy. The plot is a bit generic, though that's not the reason I'm disappointed in the story. I'm disappointed in the story because it doesn't really go anywhere that I find interesting. The storyline with Rachel is kind of dull and awkward, but also the side story with the suicide hotline is even more awkward considering the way it turned out. I think that it was just too short a story. I think that it would have been vastly improved if it were longer. That way, the author might have been able to delve deeper into the doctor's motives for some of these things, as well as the aspects of each of the other characters. We just didn't get enough information about any of these situations.

Overall, I hate to say it, but it was kind of dull. Well written, but very dull. The characters are rather generic and not very interesting. I wouldn't rate this book higher than two stars.