When Man Assumes God Status

"Island Practice" by Pam Belluck   Public Affairs Publishing   264 pages   $25.99

This is an accounting of the life of Tim Lepore, MD, on Nantucket.  Over the years, he has added jobs to his doctor's resume -- internationally-known tick expert (Lyme disease.) accidental homicide detective, medical examiner, and occasional veterinarian work.

He has a regular schedule with office hours, but he and his wife live 100 ft. away from the hospital and he encourages patients to "just stop in at the house."  He also makes house calls 24/7 when needed.  His wife said that she always wanted to marry someone interesting.

You would think that all of the above, plus serving on various civic boards would keep him busy, but he makes time to go hunting, however briefly.  He frequently wears his hunting vest in the office.  He and his fellow hunters believe that the island is overrun by deer which carry Lyme diseas ticks.  The more deer the hunters can kill in season, the better, for that reason.

He has a red-tailed hawk, Ajax, that he trained himself.  He scours the local roads for road kill to feed Ajax and grateful customers often bring tidbits they have found and bagged at his front door.  He and his wife have always had four or five dogs, all of whom shed, so he decided to try to knit garments out of dog hair.  When the unusued corners of the house became filled with plastic bags of dog hair, the wife pitched them.

His office is deliberately eccentric with smart-aleck slogans, a taxidermied armadillo, lying on its back holding a soft drink can, antique guns and posters.

I don't doubt that he has done many positive things for the community there or that he is (mostly) deeply loved by the general population.  But there was just that telling trace of thinking he is all things to all persons that gave me a frisson of alarm.  That faint, shrill cry, 'Look at me!"that was off-putting. 

Belluck is a health and medical writer for the New York Times and the Old Gray Lady's stolid lack of humor shows.  Belluck just wasn't able to pull off factual reportage with a sense of the absurb thrown in.