Saturday, February 21, 2026

A Great Medical Novel

Shelley with Alec Baldwin
and Jim Metzler in a promo pic
for their 1983 TV series Cutter To Houston

Shelley's second TV series was Cutter to Houston. It was about three young doctors with markedly different backgrounds and motives. Shelley, Jim Metzler and Alec Baldwin starred as three young doctors who ran a small hospital in the fictitious Texas small town called Cutter, 60 miles from Houston. Many publicity pics were taken help to promote the series prior to its initial run. One of the publicity pics was used on the cover of the 1994 Hungarian-language novel A Sebészasszony (The Surgeon's Wife) by Alain Thiéry. Alain Thiéry is a French author known for his medical novels which were translated to other languages including Hungarian.

Shelley with Alec Baldwin and Jim Metzler
on the Hungarian-language hardbound book
A Sebészasszony (The Surgeon's Wife)

In 1994, one of Alain Thiéry's medical novels was translated to Hungarian as A Sebészasszony (The Surgeon's Wife). It was about Ann Jessup, a talented orthopedic surgeon at a Boston hospital. The novel was released in both hardcover and paperback versions. In the hardcover version, the front cover read as:

Alain Thiéry
The Surgeon's Wife
A Great Medical Novel

The back cover read as:

We don't recommend this novel to those who aren't interested in:

– the challenging, exciting world of the medicine and accident surgery

– the life of today's upper-middle-class Americans

– the struggles of a bold and beautiful doctor to complete her important invention

– her diverse and emotional love life from Boston to an exotic archipelago

However, we do recommend this novel to those who want to read a high-quality and enjoyable book, to read one of the best medical novels of all time.