The Cutting Season

Features

• Cover Type: Hard Cover with 306 pages
• Published by: YMAA Publication Center June 25, 2007
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 1594390827
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-1594390821
• Book Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Weighs: 1.4 pounds

Product Review
A gripping story. a page-turning mystery,.. Rosenfeld's medical knowledge and martial-arts expertise reinforce an authority and clarity to the work. that's storytelling! -- Walter Anderson, President & CEO, Parade Magazine, March 31, 2007

Product Description
Dr. Xenon Pearl cuts brains for a living, and he's as good as it gets. His direct, sometimes abrasive style is forgivable in light of his skill with a scalpel, and tempered by his compassion for his patients and his friends. He is a dutiful son to his widower father, a doting grandchild to a grandfather who was once a rabbi, and he has even met the girl of his dreams. Everything is on-track for this medical golden boy. The other side of this motorcycle-riding, brilliant doctor facade is a side that Xenon (aka Zee) hides even from his father. Secretly trained since childhood by his Chinese nanny, Wu, Tie Mei--herself a martial warrior of shadowy lineage--Dr. Xenon Pearl is also a martial arts expert who loves the sword as much as the scalpel. Through Tie Mei's training of Zee, we see the philosophical and spiritual practice of a warrior, and how it guides his every step. Now his past is showing up to literally haunt him. His dead teacher reappears, reminding him of the warrior lives he has lived before, and demands he fulfill his destiny. Xenon must use his skill with a blade to protect the innocent, face down the Russian mob, protect the blade mistress who loves him, and stay one step ahead of a smart cop; he is set to lose everything unless he can cut just one more time.

Reader Reviews
Dr. Xenon Pearl, a thirty-year-old neurosurgeon, has a secret life. The Chinese nanny who raised him from the age of four spent years teaching him a unique form of martial arts drawn from Jewish, Taoist, and Buddhist thought, and he practices qigong in a hidden studio of his house. When a severely beaten child, the son of a Russian Mafia leader in Miami, dies on his operating table, Xenon sees the child's soul escape and fly around the operating theater. Minutes later, his nanny, dead for ten years, appears, telling him that "You are about to get stronger...big change is coming." In preparation for the "big change," he decides to commission a custom-made sword. As he works to protect himself from attack by Russian Mafia and by the abusive husband of a patient with severe cigarette burns on her chest, Zee must also deal with hospital politics, the reluctance of his department chair to press charges against the abusive Mafia father, and, not incidentally, his growing love for Jordan Jones, the artist who forges his sword. In continuous appearances, Wu Tie Mei, his nanny, emphasizes that she wants Xenon to "give up the scalpel" and devote himself, full-time, to martial arts, righting the wrongs committed by evil people. Though he continues his profession, he becomes a secret vigilante with his sword, blackmailing victims afterward so that they will not talk. His sword-work becomes increasingly violent, and evil-doers soon find themselves losing body parts, if not their lives, even as Zee begins to wonder he is losing his mind. Rosenfeld's novel speeds along, with Xenon's "precognitive" abilities taking the place of foreshadowing and creating a sense that this novel is operating on a different plane. He uses his straightforward style to include information and description a reader needs if s/he is unfamiliar with martial arts (and neurosurgery), but he does not bog down the narrative with excessive detail. All the characters are quirky, if not bizarre, and while this is a plot-based novel, filled with gore, the author does provide some insights into Xenon's inner world, allowing the reader to share in it. The novel, however, glorifies vigilante justice in the name of ancient philosophy and martial arts. The "hero" obeys a mystic vision and becomes a warrior, feeling that his "superior" inner philosophy allows him to take up a sword and slash in the name of his own justice, an idea that will leave some readers uncomfortable, considering current world events. When a beheading occurs, the obvious parallels are chilling. Fast-paced and full of action, this is the first of what the author indicates will be a series featuring this neurosurgeon/swordsman, his family, and associates. n Mary Whipple