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Overview
In the heart of the rain forest, something deadly is stirring. Older than life itself, it feeds on the living, silently, mercilessly, with a speed and fatality matched only by the terror of its gruesome symptoms. Patrick Lynch's Carriers captures this fear, and presents a world where the war between mankind and nature makes any victory for science temporary at best. When a plague-like outbreak strikes Indonesia and a team of American biological-warfare experts are brought in to discover its source, they find only corpses and riddles without answers - until Holly Becker arrives. She's come to the jungle to find her two young daughters, likely victims of the terrible plague, and in her quest may lie the secret to the terror that threatens to engulf them all.Deep in the rain forest, a team of American biological-warfare experts is investigating an outbreak--and discovering nothing but corpses and riddles without answers. This virus is mercilessly quick. Powerfully contagious. And most frightening of all--it is airborne. "Imagine a bug one hundred times more contagious than ebola."--USA Today. (Fictio--Pyschological Suspense)
Editorials
Publishers Weekly -
As if Richard Preston's The Hot Zone wasn't scary and exciting enough, here's a fictional account of the eruption of an ebola-like virus in a tropical setting-in this case, Sumatra. A U.S. Army medical team is sent out to seek the source of the plague at the jungle camp of an American scientist who hasn't answered radio calls for weeks. As more victims succumb, the Indonesian government takes draconian measures and the American team struggles with the jungle and the Indonesians. Meanwhile, the ex-wife of the missing scientist shows up, searching for her twin 12-year-old daughters. Lynch maintains a brisk pace as he focuses on the spread of the disease and on the search for its source and vector. High-tech medical detail boosts realism, while the author's penchant for melodrama, including numerous cliffhangers and scenes drenched in blood and other bodily fluids, may distract readers from dwelling on the two-dimensional characters and hard-to-swallow anticlimax. This is no match or substitute for the Preston, however, and Michael Crichton's The Andromeda Strain remains the outbreak novel to beat. 100,000 first printing; Literary Guild selection; audio rights to Random House Audio. (Aug.)Mary Frances Wilkens
As if real-world deadly viruses aren't scary enough, we're confronted with scientific thrillers about out-of-control viral strains. This latest in the genre involves eager botanist Jonathan Rhodes, who comes across a paleo-virus in the jungles of Southeast Asia. To make matters worse, Rhodes' young twin daughters are missing, and their camp has been ravaged. Holly Rhodes, the girls' mother and the doctor's ex-wife, is on her way to visit when she gets word that her children are missing. She forgets the safe life and loving boyfriend she left in her Manhattan high-rise as she begins a frantic search for her children. The island gradually succumbs to complete turmoil as various allied governments try haphazardly to control the epidemic. But at the very core of the outbreak is a frightening secret that Holly has the misfortune to learn. Readers who have the stomach for gore and bloodshed will find "Carriers" a fast-paced, exciting read.Book Details
Published
December 31, 1996
Publisher
Berkley Publishing Corporation,U.S.
Pages
433
Format
Paperbound
ISBN
9780425154885