Monday, December 31, 2012

Book 46: The Strain by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan


I put off reading this book for a long time—pretty much until my cousin badgered me into it—because the reviews did not make it seem appealing at all.  It wasn’t that people were saying it was bad, quite the contrary actually.  But the constant focus in the reviews of the fact that these vampire shit put me off.  I thought that the book was going to be focused more on the disgusting aspects of the vampires instead of an actual plot.  I’m glad that my presumptions were wrong; this book was very interesting and I tore right through it.

When an airplane lands at JFK without any signs of life inside there is understandable confusion and panic.  After searching the plane, authorities only find four survivors among the rest of the mysteriously dead passengers and crew, along with a large coffin filled with dirt.  The dead soon begin to rise as a strain of parasites infects the bodies, forcing them to seek out fresh blood.  A holocaust survivor, Abraham Setrakian, has faced this threat before and been preparing himself for the day when a full-scale attack would occur.  Setrakian, along with the CDC’s Ephraim Goodweather and Nora Martinez, try to stop the spread of the parasites, which would quickly destroy the human race, but have to face danger not only from the parasites, but also from those that brought it to America. 

As I said, I enjoyed this book quite a bit.  It was creepy, intriguing, and fast paced.  The only part that I took issue with was the end because of a corny line of internal dialogue.  I also didn’t realize that it was a trilogy and was frustrated that I didn’t find out the extent of the conspiracy.  I guess I’ll just have to read the other books soon!

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