The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton
RECOMMENDED
In a word: Clinical
Plot:The US sends several satellites into space to collect organisms and dust for study. One of the satellites fall to Earth outside of Piedmont, Arizona, but it carries more than just space dust. It carries a deadly virus – one that kills all but two of the town's inhabitants within minutes of exposure.
A team of scientists isolate themselves, the satellite and two survivors in an underground bunker in an attempt to find a vaccine to the deadly virus, now known as the Andromeda Strain. They are part of Project: Wildfire set up by the government for just such a contamination. They determine that the virus rapidly clots the blood of most victims, while in others it causes insanity resulting in suicide. Now Wildfire must discover why there are two survivors and if that information can save other from contamination.
Thoughts: Not as thrilling as I had hoped, but a good read if you can deal with the rather clinical way in which the story is told. It's one of Crichton's first novels and it shows a bit. Still, Crichton was WAY ahead of his time. The idea of a space virus mutating within the Earth's atmosphere is interesting, as is the way humans react to the virus. Also interesting is the way Crichton doesn't deify his scientists. They are human and make mistakes (lots of them, in fact). The characters are interesting enough, as is the technology described (though quite a bit of the tech is out of date - as this was written in 1968). Crichton was a good storyteller and tended to use lots of graphs, diagrams and charts in his work, this is no exception (at least he did before he started writing screenplays in novel form).
There is one thing I didn't like about this book and that's the ending. I felt it to be a cop out.
If you like this, try reading:JurassicParkby Michael Crichton; World War Z by Max Brooks