Coma

Robin Cook is the author -- and Coma is the book -- for which the term "medical thriller" was first used. It's a spine-chilling shocker about a crime beyond imagining and the committed young medical student who brings it to light. The surgery was routine -- the kind performed many times a day at Boston's most prestigious hospital. The teams that worked in OR #8 were among the best in the world. But even their incredible skill couldn't make up for what was happening around them. Several patients, admitted to the hospital for minor surgery, never awoke. For some inexplicable reason, their brains had been destroyed.