This is one I've never read before, but is on my shelves from my grandfather's library: Frank G. Slaughter, Sword and Scalpel. Frank Gill Slaughter (1908-2001), was a physician and surgeon who became a very successful twentieth century author, producing about one novel a year in his heyday. He also served in World War II for the U.S. Medical Corps. Most of his novels have a medical theme of some sort, sometimes a wartime medical theme, but many of his more popular novels were Biblical in theme, about St. Luke, or about Joseph of Arimathea. It's just possible I may have read at some point his book about Luke -- The Road to Bithynia -- but I'm not sure.
The 1957 Sword and Scalpel is about a doctor in the Korean War who is taken prisoner when the North Koreans capture his MASH unit. By all accounts it is a very dark and grim book about enduring -- and sometimes failing to endure -- in the most terrible times. But it is also supposed to have strong themes of self-sacrifice and friendship. So it will be quite a change; but it should be interesting.
