Shock sees cutting-edge technology and personal greed converge in Robin Cook's spine-tingling novel of medicine run amok.

Deborah Cochrane and Joanna Meissner, students and close friends, spot a campus newspaper ad that promises to solve their financial problems: an exclusive, highly profitable fertility clinic on Boston's North Shore is looking for donors. Deborah and Joanna figure they can perform a good deed in helping infertile couples, while earning some money for themselves.

Although rumours surface of a fellow donor's unexplained disappearance, they remain undeterred. The procedures seem to go smoothly, but second thoughts and curiosity prompt the two women to discover more. Stymied by the clinic's veil of secrecy, Deborah and Joanna obtain employment there to continue their probe. Working under aliases, they soon discover the horrifying true aims of Dr Windgate's research, immediately putting their lives – and their sanity – irrevocably at risk.