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stephbgAnd for a damn good reason too.
Life is full of bad signs.
Black toes, flocking crows,
Films that feature Demi Moore.
Ticking clocks, failing crops,
A stream of brightly gushing blood.
I'll add to that list, and from my dead hand rip,
The Xeno Solution, by Nelson Erlick.
Stop, for heaven's sake. No more pseudo poetry. I hate it when that happens. Geez.
OK, the bad sign of which I speak is the urge to write an unhappy review before I've finished a book. The secondary bad sign is the urge to not finish the aforementioned book.
I do love a plague story, but it's difficult to find a really good one. I picked up TXS as one of 5 for $25, which is usually a bad place to start, but it had a torn cover that might have explained its fall from grace. The blurb teased with hints of "an epidemic of catastrophic proportions" triggered by retroviruses in pig organ transplants' DNA. All right! I like a good porcine endogenous retrovirus, complete with handy acronym (PERV).
Taking a closer look, I see that the reviews on the back cover are by a couple of writers, rather than critics. Just saying.
All righty, we're introduced to a vast array of characters, most of whom are one-dimensional doctors and difficult to separate. A conspiracy emerges. Could the hitherto extremely safe pig kidney transplants be flawed? Could be a PERV, you know.
A nurse with a paper cut is exposed to an infected surgical dressing. She develops flu-like symptoms, then drops dead. Excellent. Patient Zero. I settle in to watch patients 2-n.
Meanwhile. DID YOU KNOW that viruses hidden in pig DNA could trigger a deadly epidemic?
People start running around, copying files, shooting, kidnapping, blowing up planes, having car chases, dealing with the Russian mafia, stabbing, developing Rambo-like skills of urban cunning blah blah blah. The beautiful, brilliant, but cold black-belt female head researcher of the evil medical corporation is revealed to be an impossibly sadistic and casual killer (who incidentally killed and slept her way to the top in between lab sessions). Her Daddy didn't love her, apparently. More running about. Now the FBI is interested. Government conspiracy kicks in. The lone wolf FBI agent refuses to believe it's just another muslim terrorist group and goes out on a limb to trust our hero doctor who's children are still being held captive. Et cetera.
Meanwhile. DID YOU KNOW that viruses hidden in pig DNA could trigger a deadly epidemic?
Well yes, actually. Can we get on with the epidemic now? Please.
OK. We score patient #2, another nurse with flu-like symptoms. Poor nurses. Can they go dancing and sneeze on people now?
No, wait, more guns and car chases.
Meanwhile. DID YOU KNOW that viruses hidden in pig DNA could trigger a deadly epidemic?
I'm 314 pages in, and it's 439 pages long. I'm getting impatient. I get the feeling that there's a single Wikipedia page out there that holds the honour of being the author's single source of scientific research. I bet it kept him occupied for a good half hour.
I want my epidemic but I'm not sure I can be bothered to stick with the alleged thriller bits in the meantime *yawn*.
And someone out there agrees with me. Excellent. I feel all warm and validated.
http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/12/06/020152.php
(*) It's a quote Nelson, nothing personal.
Life is full of bad signs.
Black toes, flocking crows,
Films that feature Demi Moore.
Ticking clocks, failing crops,
A stream of brightly gushing blood.
I'll add to that list, and from my dead hand rip,
The Xeno Solution, by Nelson Erlick.
Stop, for heaven's sake. No more pseudo poetry. I hate it when that happens. Geez.
OK, the bad sign of which I speak is the urge to write an unhappy review before I've finished a book. The secondary bad sign is the urge to not finish the aforementioned book.
I do love a plague story, but it's difficult to find a really good one. I picked up TXS as one of 5 for $25, which is usually a bad place to start, but it had a torn cover that might have explained its fall from grace. The blurb teased with hints of "an epidemic of catastrophic proportions" triggered by retroviruses in pig organ transplants' DNA. All right! I like a good porcine endogenous retrovirus, complete with handy acronym (PERV).
Taking a closer look, I see that the reviews on the back cover are by a couple of writers, rather than critics. Just saying.
All righty, we're introduced to a vast array of characters, most of whom are one-dimensional doctors and difficult to separate. A conspiracy emerges. Could the hitherto extremely safe pig kidney transplants be flawed? Could be a PERV, you know.
A nurse with a paper cut is exposed to an infected surgical dressing. She develops flu-like symptoms, then drops dead. Excellent. Patient Zero. I settle in to watch patients 2-n.
Meanwhile. DID YOU KNOW that viruses hidden in pig DNA could trigger a deadly epidemic?
People start running around, copying files, shooting, kidnapping, blowing up planes, having car chases, dealing with the Russian mafia, stabbing, developing Rambo-like skills of urban cunning blah blah blah. The beautiful, brilliant, but cold black-belt female head researcher of the evil medical corporation is revealed to be an impossibly sadistic and casual killer (who incidentally killed and slept her way to the top in between lab sessions). Her Daddy didn't love her, apparently. More running about. Now the FBI is interested. Government conspiracy kicks in. The lone wolf FBI agent refuses to believe it's just another muslim terrorist group and goes out on a limb to trust our hero doctor who's children are still being held captive. Et cetera.
Meanwhile. DID YOU KNOW that viruses hidden in pig DNA could trigger a deadly epidemic?
Well yes, actually. Can we get on with the epidemic now? Please.
OK. We score patient #2, another nurse with flu-like symptoms. Poor nurses. Can they go dancing and sneeze on people now?
No, wait, more guns and car chases.
Meanwhile. DID YOU KNOW that viruses hidden in pig DNA could trigger a deadly epidemic?
I'm 314 pages in, and it's 439 pages long. I'm getting impatient. I get the feeling that there's a single Wikipedia page out there that holds the honour of being the author's single source of scientific research. I bet it kept him occupied for a good half hour.
I want my epidemic but I'm not sure I can be bothered to stick with the alleged thriller bits in the meantime *yawn*.
And someone out there agrees with me. Excellent. I feel all warm and validated.
http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/12/06/020152.php
(*) It's a quote Nelson, nothing personal.
