Though I'm snobby with literature, preferring Churchill to Klosterman, I make up for it with a love of smutty television. I am addicted to shows like "House," (the only show that can make fun of a little girl with cancer and make you laugh.) And whenever I'm depressed a good glimpse of Farrah Fawcett murdering her children on Lifetime usually cheers me up. But what happens when the two collide? Television plot meets literature. It's certainly not a new concept, since aught one readers and watchers have consumed a dizzying cycle of book-to-television, television-to-book such as He's Just Not That Into You, America (The Book) and the new television series "Bones."

Even books not directly tied to a television show are beginning to show symptoms of this teleliterature revolution. Sue Grafton, Nicholas Sparks and Dean Koontz all swab their books with the tricks and trades of the television industry, such as multiple one-dimensional characters, increasingly violent and sex driven plots, flashbacks, close-ups, commercials and resolving serious moral issues with trite childhood flashbacks or convenient plot twists. This avoidance can be traced back to Henry Winkler. As the Fonz, Winkler was the ladies man who kept himself palatable by never overtly bedding the ladies. Similarly, as executive producer of "MacGyver," Winkler created a good ole' boy who managed to kill and woo without, well, killing and wooing.

One of the more recent victims of teleliterature is Adrenaline by new author and anesthesiologist, John Benedict. The book cover proclaims that murder is the ultimate rush and if that's so then be prepared for the tsunami of carnage waiting for you in this medical thriller. Adrenaline chronicles the mysterious deaths of patients at the hands of confused anesthesiologists. During this time the hospital is contemplating a merger, the protagonist, Doug Landry, is contemplating adultery, the obligatory innocent intern is trying to find his lost mother and the evil department head is reflecting on the nurses he sexually abused over the years. "Karen, Karen" he murmurs contemplating his favorite victim. It's a perfect mixture of "E.R." and "Grey's Anatomy" with, of course, a dash of "CSI" (who doesn't add a dash of that delicious spice these days?).

The story line is cleverly arched. The murders hardly seem like murders to the reader caught in the emotional swell of unfaithful husbands and drug abusing doctors. The story unfortunately climaxes in a heavy-handed shoot out. Just as the violence is nearing an end the villain reemerges hysterical, laughing and shooting behind a bulletproof shield. However, like television, it tactfully sidesteps moral dilemmas. The doctor never consummates his adulterous desire, the doctor who is abusing drugs dies in a non drug related incident before his friend can tell the supervisors and the lecherous villain gets his in a particularly non-vigilante sort of way.

But all this death, sex and general mayhem is fun. Adrenaline lightly trips from page to page, exhilarating its readers but not consuming them, evoking imagination without introspection and entertainment with no strings attached. When it's all over you feel as if you've eaten a whole bag of chips with nothing to show but greasy fingers.

So does this teleliterature make good literature? Well, no not in the traditional sense of the word good it barely even makes a good book. However, if what you want from a book is the same as what you want from a television show with the added bonus of impressing the opposite sex with your literacy, then yes, I suppose teleliterature has its value. And let's be honest, sometimes that's all we want.