Review by Ian Keogh

Completed in 2017, Surgeon X is a look into a near future dystopian UK extrapolated from then current events. Applying hindsight to such projects is always fun, and while so far Sara Kenney’s wrong about an independent Scotland, it didn’t take very long before she was proved horrifically right in predicting a global pandemic, her fictional equivalent one where an increasing number of viruses can resist current antibiotics. That second stage could yet happen as there’s been no slowdown of their use in response to medical warnings. Kenney is also on the button with the slightly easier prediction of the rise of the extreme political right and all they bring with them, this a staple of dystopian fiction.

Because only a limited amount of antibiotics work, they’re rationed and allocated on a scale of how deserving any recipient is deemed to be, meaning decisions result in people dying from currently cured infections. It’s far from the only distressing aspect of a shocking opening chapter in which lead character Rosa Scott becomes a vigilante surgeon making her own decisions about who’s worthy, while using experimental surgical techniques to treat the dispossessed. Her father is an establishment figure who runs a hospital, half brother Lewis is bipolar and not keen on maintaining his medication, and sister Martha is a medical researcher. Kenney fleshes out the characters with glimpses into their past, and perpetuates the mystery of what happened to their mother.

John Watkiss brings a crowded and chaotic world to life, but in an over-rendered and claustrophobic way in cramped panels where there’s barely room to breathe due to overuse of thick black lines and heavy shadows. There’s a lot of effort put in, but it’s not attractive art. Tragically, Watkiss died before completing Surgeon X, and although using the same style, the variety provided by Warren Pleece over the final pages is clearer.

For someone writing their first graphic novel Kenney is a revelation. The intensive research reflects her work on TV documentaries, but there’s a natural instinct for drama in the various subplots and in the lesser details fleshing out a convincing world. Who’s hacking Rose’s computers? Why do the authorities seem complicit in hampering development of new antibiotics? And what did happen to her mother? There are no immediate answers, but Kenny diverts the attention with a series of inventive crises for Rosa.

Unfortunately, though, The Path of Most Resistance is six entertaining chapters, but it doesn’t complete the story and there’s been no continuation. There’s enough going on here to repay anyone who picks the book up, but they’ll have to be the type of reader who likes to figure out a conclusion for themselves.