Mystery/Thriller Book Reviews
Page Three of FourEat, Drink and Be Wary by Tamar Myers
Signet, September 1998.Paperback, 272 pages.
ISBN: 0451192311.
Ordering information:
Amazon.com.
Magdalena Yoder, amateur sleuth and Mennonite owner of the popular inn in
Pennsylvania Dutch Country, is back in another installment of
the popular series. Brokenhearted over her former spouse's
unfortunate failure to tell her that he was already married to
someone else, Magdalena determines to keep her mind on
her work. But when she agrees to allow her inn to be the
site of a cooking contest with a large cash prize at the
request of her cook Freni (who is one of the contestants) trouble
quickly follows. The contestants are a motley crew bent on
causing trouble at the comfortable inn, then the corpse of George Mitchell,
the CEO of the gourmet food company sponsoring the
cooking contest, is found in the barn. It's up to Magdalena,
with her powers of observation and her sly Pennsylvania Dutch
sense of humor to find the killer before he strikes again.
Magdalena's latest adventure will please cozy fans and those who enjoy an inside look at the Amish and Mennonite way of life which is entertainingly portrayed by the eccentric and yet down to earth Magdalena.
The Eleventh Plague by John S. Marr, M.D., and John Baldwin
Harper Collins, January 1999.Paperback, 516 pages.
ISBN: 0061097632.
Ordering information:
Amazon.com.
After an outbreak of anthrax
violently kills two children who were on
a field trip to the San Diego Zoo and
a strange disease starts killing
horses in Churchill Downs,
virologist Dr. Jack Bryne starts
feeling the pressure of his position
as monitor of ProMed. ProMed is a medical
network on which recent outbreaks
and unsolvable illnesses are posted
in the hopes that other physicians
around the world can help
give input and solutions.
As monitor, Bryne is in charge of
determining what news items
are posted to the network.
Bryne is also called in to
personally investigate and
begins to notice
a pattern in the bizarre
disease outbreaks. He knows
he is definitely onto something when
he starts receiving strange
emails, that he can neither
save or print, which contain accounts
of horrible things that have
happened to people.
Checking the facts from the graphic
accounts in the emails, he finds
that they have actually happened.
Diseases including botulism,
anthrax, pork tapeworms, ergotism
and ciguatera are occurring.
Bryne and his staff began a race
to discover the source of the
plague outbreaks, inform other
Medical officials and convince
the FBI that Bryne himself is not
the killer.
This disease thriller starts out with a swarm of agitated bees that attack a group of people in River Walk, a scenic tourist sport in San Antonio, killing two. Throughout the novel are additional plagues, poisons, human parasites, killer diseases and other horrors with the complete grotesque details of what they can do to a living person included in graphic detail. The medical terminology and disease symptoms are accurate thanks to the expertise of author John S. Marr M.D., M.P.H., who served as director and principal epidemiologist for the New York City Department of Health, and has authored nonfiction books and articles on communicable diseases. An array of horrible diseases, old and new, are introduced in The Eleventh Plague, which is sure to please fans of the disease thriller subgenre.
Mystery Reviews
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Return to the January 1999 issue of The IWJ.
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