- Publisher : Harper
- Publication date : February 3, 2026
- Language : English
- Print length : 400 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0063290480
- ISBN-13 : 978-0063290488
- Author : Justin C. Key
The Hospital At The End Of The World by Justin C. Key tells the story of a not too distant future where The Shepherd Organization (TSO) and its Artificial Intelligence (AI) Systems oversee every medical school in the country, but one. TSO goes well beyond controlling only medical schools and hospitals with its AI systems embedded and controlling much of society.
Pok is a medical school applicant who wants to go to one of the TSO sponsored schools with their AI driven medical processes. When someone overwrites his application, he is rejected from all of them. Then his father, also a doctor, is killed and Pok is forced to flee for his life to the one medical school in the country that will have him, Hippocrates. Hippocrates is in New Orleans, Louisiana which is one of the few places that is not under AI control. They teach a human-centered medicine and Pok has trouble adapting after a lifetime in an AI-run New York.
Key does a good job of describing the difficulties in succeeding at medical school. You get the feeling that, while exaggerated to the future, much of the struggles probably rhyme with the author’s own time in medical school. It rings true for the most part. Unfortunately, not everything rings true in this book. For example, early on in the story, Pok breaks his leg and walks on the broken leg from New York to Pennsylvania. At minimum, this is 70 or 80 miles, unrealistic distance to cover on foot. Then he hops a freight which happens to take him exactly where he wants to go.
Once he gets to New Orleans, the story makes more sense, but I had a hard time really caring about most of the story. An interesting character from early on is abandoned and you don’t get to see her again until very near the end, and then she does not add to the story. Most of the characters in the book just exist, but don’t add a whole lot to the story. In the end, there is almost a deus ex machina resolution that seemed a little too easy.
Reading the above seems very critical of The Hospital At The End Of The World, and it is, but I did enjoy the book. There are a lot of good things about it, and Key is a good writer overall. I can’t say it is a must read, but I also can’t say I regret reading it.
Matt Truxaw’s newest book is Monster. This urban fantasy, horror, thriller will keep you turning the pages.
He is also the author of the hard science fiction thrillers: “Plastiphobia/Plastivore” and “Anthrophobia: A Teacher’s Tale”
You can find them all on Amazon in Paperback, Hardback, Kindle and/or free to read with Kindle Unlimited.
When you read any of them, he would really appreciate a review/rating on Amazon or your favorite book seller/book reader site.
More about Matt:
He was born in Orange County California many years ago and he still lives there. He has been reading books for most of those years and writing up book reviews for the last few years. He gets MANY of his books out of the library/Libby so expect a lot of old science fiction classics book reviews and other science related reviews in addition to newer books he comes across.
If you want to be ‘in-the-loop’ on these and other works, you can follow his website( MattTruxaw.com), his author’s page on Amazon or his Facebook page.
For more reviews and articles by Matt here on Amazing Stories (Click here).
Monster: A Novel by Matt Truxaw
