The Hot Zone
THE HOT ZONE
By Richard Preston
Rating: 4.5/5.0
A unique genre. A universal concern. Two best features for a convincing time charioting book. This book is a nonfiction thriller. Yes, you got it right. It is a thriller but not based on adventurous imaginary turmoil of some fictional characters fighting for an unattainable but magnificent object that promises a death of heroic stature if not a life of blissful success. It is about people discovering and dealing with Ebola virus that kills several hundred people in a deadly combat of life and disease.
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What is the catch? Why so special? Stephen King, the terror maker, called this 90s best seller as the scariest thing he has ever read. Would not that be considered a recommendation enough. That is why it is our pick and we are not at all disappointed. The gruesome details of the virus inside and outside the host makes one shudder, the etymological meaning of the word Horror in Latin.
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It is about 230 pages; the volume does not weigh on the reader seems like a novella for its exceptional fluidity. The tone of the narrator is not objective and dry, reporting from behind safe screen but involving engaging and addressing the audience directly influencing the minds. That narrative style alone makes the thriller real and urgent Other than the fact that these are times of another such virus Only more massive in impact being a pandemic.
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Virus is not the villain, the bad guy. That is where the freshness of content lies. It’s the human virus , the flesh that lies all around “unable to protect itself" the five billion that pokes the boundaries of natural habitat and wakes up strange creatures inviting them in until there is no place but the body to play host. The fruit bat is just a carrier, the virus just a creature, then how does Ebola erupt? It breaks out when men, like Monet intrude upon the darkness of hidden cave kept away in rainforest preventing weak human form.
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The book will keep you off those delicious snacks. Good way to diet.
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BaSila Hasnain
26-09-2020
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