tarmstrong112's review against another edition
3.0
Ebola is maybe the scariest disease and I want to stay as far away from it as possible. This book was interesting, a minute, detailed look at the beginnings of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa in 2014. Not quite as interesting as Preston's first book on Ebola, but still interesting. I felt the book spent too much time on minute details at the expense of a wider context of the Ebola outbreak. The stories of the medical workers were harrowing and very sad. The stigma and fear the people who contacted the disease (notably the medical workers) was interesting (also sad) and something I had never considered would be a reaction among people.
Overall an interesting book with some interesting stories.
Overall an interesting book with some interesting stories.
lauren_e_d's review against another edition
emotional
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
This was really interesting. It was fascinating to read this looking back on the COVID pandemic and seeing the similarities on how people approached it and how it spread and the thoughts people had. There were parts that were slower or more repetitive and there were times when I was confused because it jumped time and location. However mostly it was interesting to see this perspective of Ebola and epidemic response.
tanya_the_spack's review against another edition
5.0
Richard Preston continues to be one of my favorite authors. Excellent book. And what better time to read it than in the middle of a pandemic? Heartbreaking, fascinating, terrifying, maddening. Definitely worth reading.
laurenpedersen's review against another edition
4.0
4.5 The men and women who sacrifice their lives fighting “hot” viruses like Ebola should receive more recognition. The tenacity and adaptability of the virus is confounding. I don’t agree with all the policy decisions made but I’ve never been in a situation where so many life and death decisions had to be made. We have so much more to learn.
antidietleah's review against another edition
4.0
Super interesting! A little confusing at times but I feel like the author made a great effort at bringing the human interest in with all the science. Was happy to see Fauci make an appearance!
elizabethaugmentin's review against another edition
4.0
This was an objectively decent book, but I was a lot less enthralled than I was with his previous works. This may partly be that the last time I read one I was a teenager and not a physician with relevant work experience and real-time knowledge about the crisis, but I still think the plot was a little less personal and a was just more of a straightforward description of events. Worth reading for sure even if it wasn’t quite everything I’d hoped for!
toastberg's review against another edition
3.0
The book was overall good, but I felt that at times that the focus on individual narratives made it hard to follow the expansion of the epidemic overall. I also was surprised that the book focused so narrowly on the area immediately surrounding the initial outbreak instead of following the course of the full epidemic. And lastly, the last half of the boik almost felt like an advertisement for Mapp Bio and ZMapp. A focus on the promise of that category of medicines rather than that particular medicine would have been more appropriate, especially considering that by the time the book was published ZMapp was already being phased out as it was far less effective than other experimental drugs using the same antibody technology.
lisaeirene's review against another edition
3.0
This was really good, I'd round up to 3.5 stars. The middle part was pretty exciting and I liked the scientific stuff about Ebola and the different strains and the race to find a vaccine or a medicine. However, there were parts that felt repetitive and redundant and needed a little editing.