Emergency room doctor Meyer and his journalist cousin Koeppel (Banana) describe in this heart-wrenching report the devastating toll Covid-19 took on the Bronx in the spring and summer of 2020. Drawing on interviews with hospital staff and Meyer's "texts, emails, and confessional phone calls" during the height of the crisis, the authors vividly describe the suffering of infected patients at Montefiore Medical Center's Weiler Campus, many of whom died alone. The disease also affected friends and family members of staffers; the parents of Deborah White, medical director of the emergency department, both came down with Covid and were admitted to Montefiore. White only asked for special treatment after her father died, requesting that his body be kept in the hospital morgue, and not loaded into a refrigerated truck, until she could make funeral arrangements. Meanwhile, Meyer's mentor became severely ill and nearly died after initially refusing hospitalization. The authors capture the ad hoc response of even the most skilled doctors to an unprecedented calamity, describing the chance discovery that turning patients onto their stomachs was a safer alternative to ventilators, and raise hard questions about the U.S. health-care system's lack of preparedness. Readers will gain a visceral appreciation for what it took to battle the first wave of the pandemic. (Aug.)

With this debut, emergency room doctor Meyer collaborates with journalist Koeppel to tell a personal account of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the narrative predominately revolves around Meyer's story, it also includes vignettes from interviews with several other doctors, nurses, and medical assistants, to indicate the wide range of U.S. health care workers' experiences. Meyer recounts the pandemic from the period before it was identified, through its emergence in the United States, the virus's terrifying uncontrolled community spread, and concern about the long-term repercussions of COVID-19. The co-authors argue that forging personal connections is vital to practicing emergency medicine, and they impart health care providers' efforts to compensate for the myriad ways that personal connection was hampered by pandemic precautionary measures. The book isn't only a document of trauma; it also notes moments of joy, like when medical staff discovered new treatments with better patient outcomes, or when Meyer's mentor survived after contracting the virus. Meyer and Koeppel argue that COVID-19 revealed the dysfunction of the U.S. medical system; to that end, it might have been useful to include information about how readers can get involved in changing the system. VERDICT Overall, this memoir and sociological account enlightens, reminds us how far we have come, and is a model for practicing gratitude.--Allison Gallaspy, Tulane University, LA

A heroic physician navigates the pandemic. Meyer, an emergency room physician, teams up with his cousin, New York Times journalist Koeppel, to create a dramatic first-person account of the doctor's experience during the first six months of the pandemic at Montefiore, the largest hospital in one of America's poorest urban counties, the Bronx. Despite 25 years practicing his specialty, Meyer admits that March 2020 caught every hospital unprepared. "The members of this community," he writes, "were ready for a terrorist attack, a bombing, a mass shooting, even a chemical or biological attack, but they were not ready for a virus. Covid-19 is virulent. It is highly contagious. It can kill fast, sometimes within hours. No hospital in America was ready for that." After a quick history of the genesis of the virus, the authors hit the ground running. The city's most overwhelmed hospital, Montefiore jumped from three admissions at the beginning of March to more than 1,000 by the end. Readers will encounter sadly familiar scenes that have been described in news reports: lines of ambulances carrying patients to the hospital, rows of refrigerated trucks carrying the dead away, mourning family members gathered at the entrance, denied entry for fear of exposure. Perhaps most tragic, Covid-19 patients die alone; even those caring for them wear protective gear that hides their face. Inevitably, most of the book consists of anecdotes of victims from the community and hospital employees. The first months saw mostly deaths, confusion, and exhaustion from caregivers, but a learning curve took hold. By summer, more patients were surviving in a better-prepared hospital, and cases were declining. The book is the result of interviews with a cross section of hospital personnel, and the testimonies are moving and heartbreaking, delivering a realistic portrait of a city hospital in crisis. It's possible that some workers did not measure up, but everyone described by the authors performed superbly. Touching evidence of compassion and sacrifice during the worst of the pandemic. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.