Frank Huyler

“I have been one acquainted with the night.”
—Robert Frost

Spare, nuanced, and often dark, Huyler’s first volume of literary stories based on his experience as a medical trainee and young ER doctor focuses on patients, hospital staff, and his own responses to both. Some of these pieces aren’t for the faint of heart, and I’m talking not only about some very gruesome medical details How about a young man on on a ventilator in whose mouth maggots breed and writhe? Or the procedures involved in growing back the skin of a burn patient? but also about psychological disturbances, including those in Huyler’s colleagues. For example, a crisp, steely neurosurgery attending is addicted to an array of drugs (she even shoots up before performing procedures); she’s intrigued by the occult (particularly voodoo) and is a cruel domestic abuser. Luckily, someone informs on her. This is a stunning collection characterized by sharp, brilliant, always economical prose. Some of the stories are fragmented and cryptic to the degree that I wasn’t clear what Huyler was trying to achieve. They weren’t my favourites. Most are brief and propulsive. During pandemic times, many want to cast doctors and nurses as one-dimensional heroes. Huyler’s collection is a corrective to that. I’m not sure everyone wants to have their illusions so corrected.… (altro)

White Hot Light is a collection of short, compelling personal essays/narratives, mostly about Frank Huyler’s life in emergency medicine. A few of the pieces focus on memories of childhood and youth, and a couple of others highlight medical culture—the separate worlds of doctors and nurses, the resistance of specialists to having difficult or complex cases handed over to them from the ER, and the petty prejudices that patients wish doctors could somehow rise above. The stories are not strictly medical. They focus less on anatomy, pathology, and procedures than on moral and ethical dilemmas. Huyler is honest about his own fears, failings, and fatigue and how these have impacted his medical decision making and the care he’s provided over the years. Some stories present patients as raw, animal selves; others convey a sense of what it’s like to deal with humans at their most vulnerable, as they attempt to preserve what dignity they have left. Throughout, Huyler is determined to maintain his humanity, acknowledging how much easier the work would be if he walled himself off from the suffering of others. The writing is exceptional and nuanced—literary without being ostentatious. For all these reasons, I think the book would appeal to those who normally steer clear of nonfiction. I recommend it highly.

.… (altro)