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What I've been reading: Books No. 47-48
Sep. 27th, 2018 10:16 amBook No. 47 was "What the Dead Know" by Laura Lippman, as an audiobook. I read an essay by the author where she talks about getting some of her ideas for her thrillers from real-life stories, and that's how I ran across the author and this book. This isn't a "true crime" novel that follows the details of a real case but was inspired by a real event: How do TWO girls disappear at once from a heavily-populated public place like a mall? The story starts in the present with a woman getting into a car accident and leaving the scene. When police catch up with her, she blurts out that she is one of the "Bethany girls." She's referring to a missing persons case that is more than 30 years old where two sisters went missing from a mall. The detectives try to figure out if she's really who she says she is or if she is an imposter. And if she is an imposter, why does she know so many details that weren't released to the public? I really enjoyed this book a lot. I guessed part of the resolution, but not all of it. There were some twists and turns and surprises, but they all stemmed from clues Lippman dropped along the way. I'd like to read more by this author.
Book No. 48 was "The Andromeda Strain" by Michael Crichton. I got this used and J. and I decided to read it out loud as part of our informal "book club" with each other. This gets marketed as sci-fi but it's really more of a medical thriller and reminded me a bit of those popular old Robin Cook novels. When retrieving an outer space probe, the military finds that some infectious agent on the probe has killed most of a small western town, except for two survivors: a baby and an old drunk. A secret protocol called "Wildfire" is launched, and a team of scientists race to find out what kind of infectious agent it is, why the two people survived it, and how it can be contained or eliminated. As J. pointed out, the team doesn't actually do too much except avert one huge mistake at the end. Spoiler alert: the alien pathogen mutates into a non-lethal form all by itself. This wasn't a bad book, and I think Crichton probably did a lot of research about infectious agents that was very up-to-date when he wrote it, but less so now. Still, if I were recommending a Crichton novel to anyone, I'd suggest starting with "Jurassic Park" instead. The 1971 movie based on "Andromeda" wasn't bad and actually has a female scientist in it, unlike the book!
( The other books I've read so far this year: )
Book No. 48 was "The Andromeda Strain" by Michael Crichton. I got this used and J. and I decided to read it out loud as part of our informal "book club" with each other. This gets marketed as sci-fi but it's really more of a medical thriller and reminded me a bit of those popular old Robin Cook novels. When retrieving an outer space probe, the military finds that some infectious agent on the probe has killed most of a small western town, except for two survivors: a baby and an old drunk. A secret protocol called "Wildfire" is launched, and a team of scientists race to find out what kind of infectious agent it is, why the two people survived it, and how it can be contained or eliminated. As J. pointed out, the team doesn't actually do too much except avert one huge mistake at the end. Spoiler alert: the alien pathogen mutates into a non-lethal form all by itself. This wasn't a bad book, and I think Crichton probably did a lot of research about infectious agents that was very up-to-date when he wrote it, but less so now. Still, if I were recommending a Crichton novel to anyone, I'd suggest starting with "Jurassic Park" instead. The 1971 movie based on "Andromeda" wasn't bad and actually has a female scientist in it, unlike the book!
