This was my first Robert Ludlum novel - indeed, my first real crime thriller - and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. It opens with a handful of people dying suddenly and horribly from hemorrhagic fever. A team of army research scientists immediately set to work to isolate the virus and find a way to stop it. Meanwhile Jonathan Smith, one of their number, away on other business and blissfully unaware of the crisis, receives a blunt warning for his life from an old friend and is promptly attacked.

His fiancee, fellow scientist Sophia Russell, finally has a breakthrough, linking the virus with something she has seen before on a research trip to Peru... but the only person who might be able to help denies all knowledge, and she too is attacked. By the time Jon reaches her back home she is dying from the same virus.

From here it becomes a race against time to find out who is responsible for the attacks, Sophia's death - and, it would seem, the virus itself. Who has unleashed it, who is keeping secrets, what do they stand to gain - and how on earth can they be stopped?

It definitely kept my interest all the way through, though there were odd moments when I was jerked out of the story and thought, 'whoah, that was bad.' Ludlum insists on repeating the ranking of many of his characters, and while the descriptions of gun fights and stealth operations ring with authenticity and knowledge, the personal relationships that cement the story are a bit clunky. It might have increased the thrill factor had the romance between Jon and Sophia, and the tight bonds between Jon and his friends (and partners-in-crime), been a little less awkward in their portrayal.

All in all, a really good, well paced novel - and I would certainly read more Robert Ludlum now I've started. ( )

Dr. Jonathan Smith, USAMRIID researcher, investigates the mysteries new illness plagueing the world. Investigation takes him worlwide. ( )

A dangerous, unstoppable dieses strikes random people all over the world. Jon Smith, a military doctor is warned by a close friend to runaway and hide. Jon’s fiancé is also a scientist and discovers a way to stop the virus. Jon finds his fiancé to be infected by the disease and is puzzled because he knows there is no way she could have been infected. Jon discovers that she has been murdered and is set out on a course of vengeance. Jon learns that the virus is manufactured, and that there is a cure. Will Jon be able to find the people with cure, or will he be stopped?

The first of a spin-off series of Ludlum's, done with another writer. The protagonist here is a doctor, but he is also secretly a spy for an ultra-clandestine spook type group in the USA.

The doctor's wife is involved in looking into a mysterious ebola sort of situation, and the doctor is tasked to help out, under a supposedly plausible cover, to see what is going on.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2006/12... ( )