Customer Reviews

The Third Pandemic

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I picked up "The Deus Machine" in a closing sale at a local bookstore for under 2 bucks, and I couldn't have been more surprised with my find. Limiting my readings to hard science books, I never really got a taste for novels. Ouelette's first work introduced me to the world of the great hard science FICTION novel- and I was floored.

High off the buzz from "Deus," I picked up "The Third Pandemic" expecting much of the same. I was disappointed. Ouelette never really gives the characters any real life of their own. The cop with a past, the business man with godlike power, etc. are all present in the book- but they never transcend their potypical limitations.

Ouelette seems more content to describe the lives of microscopic bacteria in flowery prose than the lives of real people. By the fifth time reading a personified description of "tribes," "armies," and "expeditionary forces" of bacteria, i found myself wondering why the people were getting the short end of the stick.

While the book is truly scary in the sense that this can actually happen, it lacks the special attention to the human condition that would transform it into a novel. As it stands, its a nice book about some stuff you and i will never see that effects the lives of people we aren't sure we care about.

Working in the medical field and noting, from the preface, that the author had no medical background I was leery about the premise of the book. I was glad to be thoroughly proven wrong in what turned out to be a very 'drag you in and hold you till the end' book. I also found "The Third Pandemic" to be very well researched, factual and detailed (downright scary and unsettling at times). This book kept me on the edge right from the unique opener till the unexpected end (which arrived to soon for me). What can only be seen as a credit to the authors proficiency in writing, is the fact that he was able to pen such an engrossing book without resorting to blatent sexual liasons or over graphic descriptions of killings. I now eagerly look forward to reading Pierre Oullette's first book, "The Deus Machine", and any future titles he authors.

Other authors I enjoy: Eric V. Lustbader

Bubonic plague of the Medieval Period was the first pandemic, the Spanish Influenza of the early 21st century was the second pandemic, a merger of Chlamydia and strep creates "The Third Pandemic by Pierre Ouellette, a book first published twelve years ago.

Because this new disease has the power to kill half the world's population, it is given the placement of major character in the novel. The writer first describes it in terms of soldiers quiet after a defeat (the antibiotic tetracycline, part of a drug cocktail that kills most infections). When it merges with strep chromosomes, Chlamydia becomes a new entity, one resistant to all antibiotics. This merger takes place when the male human carrier has sex with a woman carrying strep/chlamydia. These viruses also mate to create an unstoppable infection ready to charge as an army and wreak havoc on the world.

Details of epidemiology, computer simulation of a spreading disease, the formula for a vacination against this disease, a health official carrying a split with reality inside his head, an amoral career criminal who rides the wave of lawlessness to create a new identity as superpower leader in the void of effective leadership during the pandemic, a police detective with an abiding moral consciousness, a female doctor whose own moral dictates recognize morality in others--all parts combine to become a unified whole in presenting a what-if apocalyptic world sure to come.

In a world of flesh-eating infections, Mad Cow disease, and SARS, a new concomitant is not surprising. There is a vaccine formula, but not a vaccine. The fact that corruption abounds in mid-level positions, as well as highest levels, the attempt to keep secret the formula for a vaccine, to hold off until monetary gain is bulging with greed, will prevent the making of this life-saving drug. No matter, the disease appears and decimates the population even as these greed-hogs maneuver for their own monetary promotion. Even as this happens, the criminal element is swifter and assumes power to terrorize and manipulate.

The two righteous characters, Detective Paris and Dr. Elaine Wilkes, come together through odd circumstance and in the line of duty, to do what is available to them to fight this pandemic. It takes its toll and wears itself out, as with all diseases. The ending is interesting, but it is the story of people, the journey of courage, the path of the disease that are the essence of the novel. What can be done, who does it, who are the heroes scattered throughout the story? All these questions determine the outcome and success of an apocalyptic novel. Frankly, I wouldn't close the book at night. I kept reading and reading and....

The Third Pandemic is a novel about the current emergence of antibiotic-resistent bacteria. I've read several books of this genre, and this is certainly one of the best. The book is at times very well written. Noteworthy is that the author employs bizzare kind literary egalitarianism as an interesting literary device: Disease is narated by ALL its participants -- bacteria living in meat, a fly landing on the infected meat and contracting he disease, an infected mouse biting on a person, that person sleeping with someone else and infecting her, etc.

This is not Camus' The Plague; If the author had some profound message to share with his readers, he sure didn't develop it here, but it is a nice and interesting novel nevertheless.

This novel was written several years before the SARS panic in 2003 and illustrates what could happen if a new virulent bacteria manages to get loose in the world population. I think that the recent response to SARS illustrated how the world in general would react.

The main problems I had with the novel were (1) a few too many subplots running in parallel and (2) a lot of digression into excruciating details of bacteriology, computer engineering, telephone message scrambling, etc. (far more than what is needed for the main plot). The author seems to be trying to show off his technical knowledge to the point where the average reader might be left a little glassy-eyed. It reminds me of old expression about asking someone the time, and having the person tell you how to build a clock.

Most of the white hats survive, and the main black hats are eliminated. The novel treats the bacteria as characters in the story, and some bacteria always survive.

I found this book in a bargain bin at my local public library. It did not deserve to be there.

A great medical thriller with many, many twists and definitely not ordinary.

Not ordinary because all the characters are superbly developed and portrayed. Realistic dialogue that is unique to each character. Great backstories that make sense and are pulling at your heartstrings.

Not ordinary because this pandemic is not caused by an evil villain, although evil villains try to take advantage of it.

Nor ordinary because there is no miracle cure uncovered just in time to save the population in a dramatic fashion, although tragically and ironically there could have been.

Not ordinary because we get scenes from the viewpoint of a parrot, a fly and even a microbe!

Not ordinary because the technology in the book is right on target and realistic as hell. (Watch to see how many of today's technologies the author predicted in this book have already come along).

Terrific book. Great scope. Impressive character development. No stereotypes.

The author had many opportunities to let this book disintegrate into the banal or the absurd, but he never chose the easy way out. And it shows.

The propagation of an unabated global plague that threatens the extinction of mankind, is the central theme of Pierre Ouellette's outstanding novel "The Third Pandemic". The mutation of the organism causing psittacosis, an avian borne pneumonia type disease threatens the demise of the world in a manner similar to that of Black Death in the Middle Ages.

The decimation of the disease is experienced through the eyes of four well developed characters, two heroes and two villains. Seattle police lieutenant Phil Paris is obsessed with discovering the identity of a mysterious person that he is convinced "poisoned" his wife. While eating at a local restaurant, he observed a strange person exiting from the kitchen. Within a short time his diabetic wife Ginny succumbed to a severe case of Salmonella poisoning which left her in a vegetative coma.

The mysterious person known as Vincent, is a schizophrenic maniac who on numerous instances over the course of years has introduced pathogens into food in other establishments for unknown reasons.

Meanwhile epidemiologist and researcher Dr. Elaine Wilkes of the Webster Foundation, a subsidiary of Uni Corporation, has devised a computer model for the developement of a worldwide plague for which there is no known cure. It is postulated that this bug has a 72 percent probability of appearing within a ten year period. Her model could help Uni formulate an antibiotic cure or vaccine which could potentially net billions.

Unfortunately, due to a series of fantastic circumstances, this lethal plaque actually does break out in Sao Tome, an island 150 miles off the coast of central Africa. Owing to a long incubation period and the unknown nature of the disease, it is spread by both travelers and inhabitants leaving the island. Soon a pandemic threatening to wipe out 60 percent of the world population is unleashed.

The possible cure, which lies within the information contained in Dr. Wilkes' computer disks, becomes the focus of several opportunists. One such person is a ruthless criminal genius Barney Cox, who orchestrates his release from prison by coercing a high ranking Uni official. He is angling toward securing the precious computer disks.

Ouellette using vast knowledge of basic microbiology crafts a very frightening but believeable scenario that is within the realm of possibility. I was very impressed with several passages that detailed mechanisms of bacterial mutation and infection at the cellular level.

Everyone has heard of bacteria gaining resistance to antibiotics, this novel takes resistance to a deadly extreme, helped along by international travel. In addition to a great thriller in it's own right, Pierre Ouellette gives readers little lessons in biology and epidemiology, very informative and interesting indeed, for example, the bacteria involved here, Chlamydia, is overwhelmingly unstoppable and spreads very easily due largely to it's slow build-up of symptoms, allowing an infected person to spread it widely without being aware of it.

Plot and character development are superb. A Lt. Paris of the Seattle Police Department is chasing a small time bio-killer in the area, and he is quickly caught up in a much larger scenario, one of natures' making. Much of the story involves a Dr. Elaine Wilkes who has research data for a vaccine against the plague, others are intersted in getting their hands on this data for their own self-interest. There are many characters in this novel, all are fully formed and believable, the story was a page turner for me, well worth reading, and scientifically plausible.

I work in the medical field and snapped up this book to read. While it was an oK book, it flat lined on substance. It was bogged down in details on how the bug spread and the characters were spread too thin.

I guess that I got hooked into this story early on by being introduced to some germs that were patiently waiting for their opportunity to finally make something of themselves. This so close-to-realty thriller packs quite a punch, and in the process teaches you a lot about viruses, bacteria, and their propagation. It spends a lot of time detailing and explaining the circumstances of how a global bio-disaster comes about.

You will be on the edge of your seat as you await the inevitable holocaust. There is a lot of suspense as the story jumps around to various circumstances, incidents and characters around the world, that eventually form the collaborative underpinnings to support the disaster that is to befall the global community.

Basically, the story is about how a devastating and complex plague emerges and rapidly decimates the human population around the world. It incorporates elements of corporate ethics and espionage, as well as domestic terrorism. Although the central characters are a policeman and a scientist, there are many others who play important roles throughout the story - business people, a prostitute, a parrot, a prisoner, and many more.

Interestingly, the germs that cause the plague are presented as characters as well. They take on an anthropomorphic disposition to give the reader a sort of a one-on-one dialog about how they appear to "think", and like other living organisms, ensure their survival and evolution to higher levels.

The Third Pandemic illustrates how new, lethal pathogens can emerge and quickly destroy their hosts. It also makes you realize the importance of having public agencies providing proactive and globally coordinated efforts to identify and respond to such potential and actual epidemics. Although this book is chilling in its implications about germs and our vulnerability to them, it also provides considerations that we all should be aware of as we prepare for responses to emerging biological challenges.