“Because of an organ shortage, most of the patients were at death’s door before they received a liver, and many died waiting.”

Cut is a medical mystery novel diving into the murky world of organ donation. Sarah Golden is a transplant nurse who loves her job. She is confident that people cannot manipulate the organ donation system and travels around the country assisting the top transplant teams. But a run-in with a wealthy patient and her boyfriend during her stay at a Miami hospital leaves her with a bad feeling, and a lingering question: can you buy a liver?

The novel started off with an interesting premise. The author weaves in the reality of the transplant world within the pages of the first few chapters while introducing Sarah. You get a feel for not just the medical aspect, but the administrative as well.

Unfortunately, the rest of the novel was a miss for me.

Perhaps I was expecting this to be a mystery like so many that I read, where the reader is also unsure of what exactly is going on, so there’s a reason to continue to turn the pages. You want to solve the mystery. But, this is a case of too much tell and not enough show.

We are told the mystery from the very beginning, and there’s aren’t any plot twists or grand reveals to keep the reader involved. The writing relies entirely on your connection to the characters to drive the plot forward, and for me, they just weren’t that strong. I liked Sarah and Jackie, but their antics were a bit far fetched to be plausible. While Amanda and Sergio were very cliche villains. Rather than showing us a complex look at power and wealth, they are simply beautiful rich people who throw tantrums whenever their wealth doesn’t get them what they want.

This struck me as a good skeleton of a draft. The idea is good and the premise is interesting. It just felt like more of a draft than a finished product. The dialogue needed polished, and again, the mystery could have unfolded a bit more dramatically. Or at least with a touch more suspense.

I also found it difficult to keep up with the end. It felt rushed, things simply fell into place that wouldn’t. And I still am unclear what the legal issues were (outside of the obvious one, which I won’t reveal because of spoilers). It felt like a case of the author writing an ending, and the details of plausibility weren’t really taken into account.

All that said, the novel was a fast read and I can see why people enjoy it. This would be a good easy beach read. The characters are comedic, and if you find more enjoyment in character antics than a suspenseful mystery, I think this book would be perfect.

Thank you BookSparks for sending me a copy to read and review.