Customer Reviews

Midnight Plague

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What if the Nazis had biological weapons that they were planning to use against the Allies during D-Day? What if the British had their own secret weapon that they were planning to use against the Germans? These and other questions are at the heart of "Midnight Plague," a spy thriller by Gregg Keizer. The hero is Frank Brink, an American doctor who has conducted research on anthrax. However, his heart is not in destroying lives but in saving them.

A complicated series of events brings Frank together with Alix, a Frenchwoman whose father died after rescuing a group of Jews who had deliberately been infected with plague. Alix is obsessed with Juniper, a Brit who has a hidden agenda that he is not revealing. Wollenstein is a calculating German scientist whose dreams of personal glory rest on the cruel experiments he is conducting using Jewish prisoners. He wants to spread plague among the Allies and come up with an antidote that will protect the Germans. Kirn is a German policeman whose loyalty to his country is shaken by the horrors he sees around him. The paths of these and other characters intersect at some point during the novel. Will the Nazis succeed in stopping the Allied invasion using their deadly weapon, or will Brink and his cohorts somehow stop them in time?

"Midnight Plague" has an intriguing premise, but Keizer's convoluted plot and sluggish pacing undermine the effectiveness of his story. The characters are one-dimensional, the love story is tepid, the action scenes are implausible, and the plot is cluttered and incoherent. There are other better written and more exciting spy thrillers that I do recommend. Among them are Greg Rucka's "Private Wars," Brad Thor's "Blowback," and Stella Rimington's "At Risk."

The deadline for D-Day is drawing near.A fishing boat comes aground on
British shore with a boatful of dead passengers.It is discovered that
they have died from a mysterious illness.Dr Frank Brink who has been
working with the British on an antibiotic to thwart a biological by the
Axis forces is sent to investigate.Dr. Brink interviews the surviving
member of the crew Alix and discovers that a dreaded biological weapon is being tested within the French lines.He suspects that it is pneumonic plague which has a one hundred percent death rate.
Dr.Brink and Alix must infiltrate occupied France.They have to locate the laboratory where the disease is being tested.They must find this location because the invasion of Normandy is close at hand.He has to stop his German counterpart from releasing the biological terror upon the
invading Allied forces.Another part of his mission is to steat the antidote if possible.
I found this book to be an exciting read just like the previous book "The Longest Night".Be sure to read this book.

The book is not well written. I have several books on WWII and the Germans. There is not riviting plot or an gripping passages I seen. I put the book down by chapter 6.

Mr Keizer's second novel is as entertaining and engrossing as his first.
His charactors throb with realism and excitement. Well worth the read.

This effort fails to live up to the promise that Keizer's first WW2 novel displayed. Thrillers are supposed to thrill. This book doesn't. The long tedious descriptions of uninteresting characters serve only to break up the unemotional dialogue and by-the-number action pieces that pop up occasionally. The protagonist might be the least-interesting main character I've read about in quite some time, and the villains are even more boring than the protagonist. In a WW2 thriller there should be Nazis to root against, but the SS-members depicted here are not threatening.



This is a great book to read when you're trying to induce sleep. If you want excitement, try Greg Iles "Rising Phoenix," or even Keizer's first book.

Frank Brink is an American doctor, who is interested in the plague. When in early June 1944 a French fishing boat reaches the English shore with a load of Jews dying form the plague, the English military fears that the Germans will react to the invasion of Normandy by setting free a biological weapon based on the plague. Frank Brink is sent to France with a deadline plus two men from the Secret Service who appear to have their own orders plus the young woman who took the boat the England and remained free of the plague. Their adversaries are SS officers and doctors with big egos and no consciences whatsoever.

In principle a very interesting theme around the use of infectious organisms for biological weapons, but the book somehow does not become interesting. the Germans (apart from one Kripo) are caricatures and so sadistic that it becomes gross, the perspective from which the story is told changes with every few pages and a few times when the author does not know how to solve all the problems that the main persons ran into, some bombs mysteriously appear and kill all the Germans, leaving the main characters unscathed. All in all this lead to a less-than-believable book, a missed chance...

Set in the days leading up to D-Day comes this historical thriller with a medical twist. Frank Brink, an American doctor, embarks on a mission to find a German lab that is rumored to be producing what the Allies fear is a horrific biological weapon. Their tipoff came from a French fishing boat found on a British coast, its hold filled with dead Jews --- and one surviving Frenchwoman named Alix Pilon.

The English are very edgy, partly because it was their original idea to spray anthrax spores on the continent to infect their enemies. But Brink's German counterpart, Dr. Wollenstein, has been infecting the Jews with pneumonic plague, a deadly disease that leaves no one alive, in order to experiment with the effectiveness of his antidote. If Wollenstein can successfully create a vaccine to cure the plague, he will have no hesitation about dropping clouds of the Pasteurella pestis on the English and American soldiers coming ashore --- at the very least. He believes he can simply vaccinate his own German troops and wipe out everyone else. But it is a very ugly way to die, and his antidote must first be proven. Thus, he leaves behind himself a string of bodies blackened by the plague.

Brink was working on his own serum for the Pasteurella pestis, but the impending threat of a possible biological attack on England sends him scurrying for the source lab the Germans have set up in France. Alix finds herself the American's unlikely ally. It was her father's fishing boat that held the unfortunate victims discovered aboard. For some reason, she blames herself and offers her help in tracking down the "devil" whose work is devising this nasty killer, in order to avenge her father's death. Alix and Brink work together while the clock counts down to June 6, 1944, and the body count mounts up.

But roaming the French countryside in search of the pestis proves far more dangerous than Brink had feared. Rounding a curve can bring them face to face with a contingent of hostile Germans. Even though Brink speaks German, as well as French, his accent draws instant suspicion. And when he and Alix aren't being troubled by enemy soldiers along the way, they are by turns avoiding the sick and attempting to minister to their needs. Either threat could bring them the promise of great suffering and ultimate, if not instant, death.

Stale from a steady diet of lab work, Brink worries that he no longer can save lives. And the problem is further complicated by the fact that many of the wounded they encounter are enemy personnel. His is a personal journey to reaffirm his worth, as they race against time to save the world from a cataclysmic devastation beyond imagination.

Despite a distracting profusion of characters, the subject, with good solid writing behind it, will make MIDNIGHT PLAGUE a popular read for historical thriller fans. And the medical angle will draw in even more readers.

--- Reviewed by Kate Ayers

It is only a matter of days before the Allies land on the beaches of Normandy and the Germans know it is coming though they don't know the correct day. American Doctor Frank Brink who once developed biological weapons is now trying to create antibiotics to counteract any act of bioterrorism that the Germans throw at them.

The French Resistance rescues Jews who are then sent by boat to England. They don't know that the people they have saved have been contaminated with pneumonic plague which has a hundred percent kill rate. SS scientist Wollenstein bought the germs from the Asians and is using it on the Jews along with trying to create an antibiotic that will keep the Germans safe from the disease. His plan is to have the planes spray the germs over England. Brink is sent to stop him using any means available. A Resistance fighter guides Brink to Wollenstein's lab but there are other Germans who are willing to have what the doctor created in their hands. Brink fights with the various German factions, but also must quickly find the antibiotic because he and the beautiful Resistance fighter are infected and need the medicine immediately.

Gregg Keizer has written a fantastic historical thriller that could be taken out of today's WMD headlines. The use of germ warfare goes back at least to medieval times and there is no reason to believe that countries will stop using it in the future. There is plenty of action in MIDNIGHT PLAGUE while the characters are symbols rather than three dimensional people. This doesn't take away from the enjoyment of reading this book because the stereotypes are easily recognizable and understandable.

Harriet Klausner