Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.62 AVERAGE
3.62 AVERAGE
I picked this book up when I started recording the series, so that I would read the book first and then see the series. Which now I'm planning on doing.
When a Boeing 777 plane lands in JFK airport in New York, all transmission from the plane has been cut off. The tower tries to contact the pilot but the plane seems to have died. No transmission, no lights, no engines. Nothing.
So, they send for the CDC's Dr. Ephraim "Eph" Goodweather and his team to check it out.
The result: All passengers are dead.
So they embark on a mission to solve the mystery and later on to stop the spreading of a virus that seems to turn New Yorkers to vicious vampires.
It was a scary thrilling ride through the book. The beginning of the book was so captivating and scary that it made me go on and on.. I couldn't put it down except to recap and think about what I just read and imagine it clearly. The legend of Sardu was chilling!!
Then in the middle of the book it started to drag and I really had to keep up with so many characters. It took me ages (literally: months) to go past that but I pulled through and the last third of the book went flying.. The excitement and action was all there.. I loved it.
That was the reason for the 4 stars and not 5 although it's been a while since a book got me from the first chapter. This was a book that did.
I will start watching the series I recorded as soon as I have some free time to spare and meanwhile consider getting the second book in the series to read.
When a Boeing 777 plane lands in JFK airport in New York, all transmission from the plane has been cut off. The tower tries to contact the pilot but the plane seems to have died. No transmission, no lights, no engines. Nothing.
So, they send for the CDC's Dr. Ephraim "Eph" Goodweather and his team to check it out.
The result: All passengers are dead.
So they embark on a mission to solve the mystery and later on to stop the spreading of a virus that seems to turn New Yorkers to vicious vampires.
It was a scary thrilling ride through the book. The beginning of the book was so captivating and scary that it made me go on and on.. I couldn't put it down except to recap and think about what I just read and imagine it clearly. The legend of Sardu was chilling!!
Then in the middle of the book it started to drag and I really had to keep up with so many characters. It took me ages (literally: months) to go past that but I pulled through and the last third of the book went flying.. The excitement and action was all there.. I loved it.
That was the reason for the 4 stars and not 5 although it's been a while since a book got me from the first chapter. This was a book that did.
I will start watching the series I recorded as soon as I have some free time to spare and meanwhile consider getting the second book in the series to read.
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Relectura.
Hace muchos años atrás, cuando estaba por estrenarse The Strain, la serie basada en esta trilogía de del Toro y Hogan, había leído Nocturna y recordaba haberlo disfrutado mucho. La serie, luego, me encantó: esa mezcla de mitología, sangre y elementos bizarros me fascina (aún hoy, a la distancia).
La relectura fue placentera: me acordaba el argumento en líneas generales, pero fue interesante redescubrir los detalles olvidados y a los personajes, con sus matices y sus vueltas. La escritura no es espectacular, es cierto. Abunda en descripciones inútiles, pero en general mantiene un ritmo firme y relativamente ágil. Se trata de una novela coral, digamos, aunque el narrador siempre está en tercera va focalizando en cada personaje, de los cuales el que más se disfruta, a mí entender, es Vasily Fet, el personaje pragmático, el brazo armado de esta guerra.
No he leído las secuelas, así que ahora ansío hacerlo.
Hace muchos años atrás, cuando estaba por estrenarse The Strain, la serie basada en esta trilogía de del Toro y Hogan, había leído Nocturna y recordaba haberlo disfrutado mucho. La serie, luego, me encantó: esa mezcla de mitología, sangre y elementos bizarros me fascina (aún hoy, a la distancia).
La relectura fue placentera: me acordaba el argumento en líneas generales, pero fue interesante redescubrir los detalles olvidados y a los personajes, con sus matices y sus vueltas. La escritura no es espectacular, es cierto. Abunda en descripciones inútiles, pero en general mantiene un ritmo firme y relativamente ágil. Se trata de una novela coral, digamos, aunque el narrador siempre está en tercera va focalizando en cada personaje, de los cuales el que más se disfruta, a mí entender, es Vasily Fet, el personaje pragmático, el brazo armado de esta guerra.
No he leído las secuelas, así que ahora ansío hacerlo.
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Blood, Medical content, Murder
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I've entered the vampire world through the first two volumes of the Anita Blake series... and didn't venture much far (I have the rest of this series on e-book even though I don't like this format that much, but I like to keep some around for those times in which I might get bored while on the pc and feel like reading something). After that I picked up Meyer's saga, which again wasn't a success, and finally I read Dracula by Bram Stoker which didn't exactly matched my expectations. Despite having read not that much about these creatures, I already knew some variants of the myth (through Slayra's courtesy, who also lent me this book) and it was with some curiosity that I read this book, where vampirism is a sort of "disease".
The story begins with an airplane landing in New York, but something is amiss since no one comes out and even the plane seems "dead". CDC's epidemiologists are called and they discover that crew and passengers are all, but four, dead due to unknown causes as no traces of blood nor of struggle are found. Following the investigation they're faced with a myth and an epidemic, which if not stopped at time, can destroy all humanity.
This book must be read as a movie, or didn't it also have the signature of a renowned director (who I can confirm has a very weird image of vampires... remember Blade II? Here the vampires are more or less like the hybrids), who I am sure must have contributed for very visual descriptions. Besides that, you can find many clichés one sees on this kind of movies: the hero with personal problems, the elderly teacher who tries to warn and find a pupil to whom he can pass is knowledge, a villain who tries to take over the world and countless situations with endings one guess even pages away... But all this, along with the scientific explanations for this kind of vampires and how are they linked to the myth, with some mentions to Stoker's work, turn the reading addictive and compulsive – I would find myself picking it up whenever I had a couple of seconds to spare to read it, something few books have been able to do lately.
The mystery is also well structured, even if some flaws can be found here and there (for example, I didn't quite understood how the collective conscience coexisted with the individual and why 4 people were left alive, when the "disease" is also spread by the dead/zombie-like people), and it clears the way for a second volume as the end is left opened. I have some theories but I really look forward to the next volume.
The story begins with an airplane landing in New York, but something is amiss since no one comes out and even the plane seems "dead". CDC's epidemiologists are called and they discover that crew and passengers are all, but four, dead due to unknown causes as no traces of blood nor of struggle are found. Following the investigation they're faced with a myth and an epidemic, which if not stopped at time, can destroy all humanity.
This book must be read as a movie, or didn't it also have the signature of a renowned director (who I can confirm has a very weird image of vampires... remember Blade II? Here the vampires are more or less like the hybrids), who I am sure must have contributed for very visual descriptions. Besides that, you can find many clichés one sees on this kind of movies: the hero with personal problems, the elderly teacher who tries to warn and find a pupil to whom he can pass is knowledge, a villain who tries to take over the world and countless situations with endings one guess even pages away... But all this, along with the scientific explanations for this kind of vampires and how are they linked to the myth, with some mentions to Stoker's work, turn the reading addictive and compulsive – I would find myself picking it up whenever I had a couple of seconds to spare to read it, something few books have been able to do lately.
The mystery is also well structured, even if some flaws can be found here and there (for example, I didn't quite understood how the collective conscience coexisted with the individual and why 4 people were left alive, when the "disease" is also spread by the dead/zombie-like people), and it clears the way for a second volume as the end is left opened. I have some theories but I really look forward to the next volume.
Recommended for anyone who powered through the shit weasels in “Dreamcatcher” and is now impervious to anything of that realm.
Originally Posted on Shot Glass Literature: https://shotglasslit.wordpress.com/
What if instead of fangs, vampires had mutant sucker tongues that erupted out of their throats, like the “Alien” Chestburster meets a pale and angry frog? What if they had Barbie doll genitalia, just so we could talk about Barbie doll genitalia once in a while? I flew through the beginning of this book (Unknown doomsday virus brings down an airplane? Sign me the fuck up.), but my enthusiasm almost entirely fizzled out with about 75 pages left. Once the mystery was solved and we got down to just killing vampires, I felt my interest draining faster than blood out of an airline passenger. Let’s mention one more time that Eph - the CDC worker turned vampire hunter - used to be a healer, but now he’s a slayer. Don’t show how Eph feels about this. Just state it again flat-out because, if it sounded cool the first time (it didn't), it will sound even cooler the 51st time. I’ve always considered vampire lore pretty hokey, but I couldn’t resist the siren call of a good pandemic. And indeed I loved the outbreak part of this story, but there’s only so much sunshine and silver this girl can take…
Originally Posted on Shot Glass Literature: https://shotglasslit.wordpress.com/
What if instead of fangs, vampires had mutant sucker tongues that erupted out of their throats, like the “Alien” Chestburster meets a pale and angry frog? What if they had Barbie doll genitalia, just so we could talk about Barbie doll genitalia once in a while? I flew through the beginning of this book (Unknown doomsday virus brings down an airplane? Sign me the fuck up.), but my enthusiasm almost entirely fizzled out with about 75 pages left. Once the mystery was solved and we got down to just killing vampires, I felt my interest draining faster than blood out of an airline passenger. Let’s mention one more time that Eph - the CDC worker turned vampire hunter - used to be a healer, but now he’s a slayer. Don’t show how Eph feels about this. Just state it again flat-out because, if it sounded cool the first time (it didn't), it will sound even cooler the 51st time. I’ve always considered vampire lore pretty hokey, but I couldn’t resist the siren call of a good pandemic. And indeed I loved the outbreak part of this story, but there’s only so much sunshine and silver this girl can take…
Meh. Interesting, but didn't keep my interest. Some pieces were very intriguing, but not the majority, and it feels like a wash of the recent vampire/etc everything. It wasn't a waste of time, but I probably won't read anymore of the series.
Vampires never really scared me... Was it because they are overused? Or did the one vampire who actually scare me surpass all the others? Admit it... Christopher Lee was THE Dracula!
When I saw Guillermo Del Toro's 'Blade 2', I was pleasantly suprised by the way how he showed us a new kind of vampires. Grose, animal-like creatures who spread like a plague and how a peculiar way of 'biting'.
![description](https://33.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lzceaiavCL1ql510eo1_500.gif")
Looks like this movie wasn't the first time he came with these creatures.
Although I think Guillermo is a masterful director, his writing skills aren't as good. While the story takes some time to build up, the final action goes way too fast.
The characters are interesting enough, but some of them don't get enough attention. Ephraïm and Setrakian get the time they deserve to make you care about them, but what about Gus and Vasily Fet? Come on, people... Fet deserves way more action in this book!
There are moments where the book goes a bit too deep into the science, but I think that's what makes it different from all the other vampire stories.
Instead of 1 person who feeds on blood and searches for a partner, this vampire slowly builds up a plan to 'infect' everyone and build an army!
And yes, I have seen the first season of the series. It didn't spoil anything for me, but I thought the series succeeded better in exploring all the different characters...
When I saw Guillermo Del Toro's 'Blade 2', I was pleasantly suprised by the way how he showed us a new kind of vampires. Grose, animal-like creatures who spread like a plague and how a peculiar way of 'biting'.
Looks like this movie wasn't the first time he came with these creatures.
Although I think Guillermo is a masterful director, his writing skills aren't as good. While the story takes some time to build up, the final action goes way too fast.
The characters are interesting enough, but some of them don't get enough attention. Ephraïm and Setrakian get the time they deserve to make you care about them, but what about Gus and Vasily Fet? Come on, people... Fet deserves way more action in this book!
There are moments where the book goes a bit too deep into the science, but I think that's what makes it different from all the other vampire stories.
Instead of 1 person who feeds on blood and searches for a partner, this vampire slowly builds up a plan to 'infect' everyone and build an army!
And yes, I have seen the first season of the series. It didn't spoil anything for me, but I thought the series succeeded better in exploring all the different characters...
When Abraham Setrakian was just a little boy, his grandmother told him about a story of a man named Jusef Sardu. Jusef was born with a disease that left him weak and having to rely on a cane to walk. You could tell when Jusef was near as you could hear the pick-pick-pick of his cane. While out hunting, Jusef's father vanishes. A search party is formed and slowly one by one of Jusef's cousins and uncles also disappear till only Jusef is left.
Jusef finds his father's body as well as all of his cousins and uncles bodies, near a cave. Jusef vows to kill the monster. That was eleven weeks ago. No one has heard or seen from Jusef since then. Till one day Jusef reappears, a changed man. He no longer requires the use of a cane and has become nocturnal. Abraham once had an encounter with Jusef. Now many years later, Abraham still can't get the sound of the pick-pick-pick out of his head.
Present Day
Something has happened at JFK airport. A huge Regis 777 has landed and is just sitting on the runway. All of the lights have been turned off as well as the shades and doors locked. A group of airport officials gather by the aircraft. As they are trying to figure out how to enter the plane, the rear door opens. They enter and what they find is cause enough to call the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Dr. Ephraim Goodweather and his team arrive. Inside the aircraft, it seems all two hundred passengers have dead but as Dr. Goodweather and his team are about to start removing the bodies, they find four survivors.
The survivors have no clue about what transpired. The only clue Dr. Goodweather has at this time lies in the cargo area of the plane. There he finds what looks to be a coffin. All of the bodies have now been transported to area morgues. Before Dr. Goodweather can check out the coffin in more detail, it disappears. When Abraham hears about what has took in place at JFK, he closes up his shop and heads to Dr. Goodweather. He has something to tell him that he believes Dr. Goodweather will be very interested to hear about.
For anyone who loves vampires, then you have got to get your hands on a copy of this book. Dr. Goodweather may seem like the silent quiet type but he is very intelligent and has a fighting spirit in him. Also beware old men who walk with a cane or you will find yourself at the business end of a very sharp sword. I dare you not to get sucked in. Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan are a dynamic duo. The Strain will leave you craving more. My only regret is that I finished this book so quickly and now I have to wait till next year for book two in this trilogy. The Strain is the classic story of good vs. evil.
Jusef finds his father's body as well as all of his cousins and uncles bodies, near a cave. Jusef vows to kill the monster. That was eleven weeks ago. No one has heard or seen from Jusef since then. Till one day Jusef reappears, a changed man. He no longer requires the use of a cane and has become nocturnal. Abraham once had an encounter with Jusef. Now many years later, Abraham still can't get the sound of the pick-pick-pick out of his head.
Present Day
Something has happened at JFK airport. A huge Regis 777 has landed and is just sitting on the runway. All of the lights have been turned off as well as the shades and doors locked. A group of airport officials gather by the aircraft. As they are trying to figure out how to enter the plane, the rear door opens. They enter and what they find is cause enough to call the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Dr. Ephraim Goodweather and his team arrive. Inside the aircraft, it seems all two hundred passengers have dead but as Dr. Goodweather and his team are about to start removing the bodies, they find four survivors.
The survivors have no clue about what transpired. The only clue Dr. Goodweather has at this time lies in the cargo area of the plane. There he finds what looks to be a coffin. All of the bodies have now been transported to area morgues. Before Dr. Goodweather can check out the coffin in more detail, it disappears. When Abraham hears about what has took in place at JFK, he closes up his shop and heads to Dr. Goodweather. He has something to tell him that he believes Dr. Goodweather will be very interested to hear about.
For anyone who loves vampires, then you have got to get your hands on a copy of this book. Dr. Goodweather may seem like the silent quiet type but he is very intelligent and has a fighting spirit in him. Also beware old men who walk with a cane or you will find yourself at the business end of a very sharp sword. I dare you not to get sucked in. Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan are a dynamic duo. The Strain will leave you craving more. My only regret is that I finished this book so quickly and now I have to wait till next year for book two in this trilogy. The Strain is the classic story of good vs. evil.