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The Strain by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan
The Blurb On The Back:
In one week, Manhattan could be gone.
In four weeks, the country.
In eight weeks ... the world.
At New York’s JFK Airport an arriving Boeing 777 taxis along a runway and suddenly stops dead. All the blinds have been drawn, all communications channels have mysteriously gone quiet. Dr Ephraim Goodweather – head of a rapid-response team investigating biological threats – boards the darkened plane ... and what he finds makes his blood run cold.
Meanwhile, in a pawnshop in Spanish Harlem, aged Holocaust survivor Abraham Setrakian knows that the war he has been dreading his entire life is finally here.
Before the next sundown Eph and Setrakian must undertake the ultimate fight for survival. A terrifying contagion has come to the unsuspecting city – hungry, merciless, lethal ... vampiric?
Dr Ephraim ‘Eph’ Goodweather heads up a CDC rapid response team in New York. A recovering alcoholic, he’s engaged in a custody battle with ex-wife, Kelly for his 11 year-old son Zack, and attracted to his beautiful, capable colleague, Nora Martinez.
Eph’s planned weekend with Zack is interrupted when a 777 lands at JFK Airport and suddenly stops on the runway. When its pilots fail to respond to air traffic control and there are no obvious signs of life within the plane itself, Eph’s team is called in to investigate. What they find is more chilling than any terrorist act or sudden epidemic – the passengers strapped into their seats are dead with only one survivor left in each of the three cabins.
As Eph tries to work out what has happened, he’s contacted by Abraham Setrakian, a Holocaust survivor who warns that both the survivors and the dead must be destroyed for they are vampires and if left unchecked, New York will fall to their infection ...
The first in a trilogy, Del Toro and Hogan portray vampirism as a parasite/disease, one that takes over the human carrier completely and which is used by a sinister master vampire to extend his influence and control. Although the plot centres around Eph and Abraham, there’s a wide cast of characters – from casual victims to relatives concerned at what’s happening to loved ones. That makes for a lot of repetition of symptoms and events and also makes it curiously difficult to sympathise with the main characters and their struggle to try and stop the disaster.
The characters themselves are stereotypes straight out of central casting – Eph is the stereotypical recovering alcoholic divorcee and devoted dad whose job just keeps getting in the way. Abraham is the wise old man who’s seen it all before and who alone knows how to fight an ancient enemy. This isn’t a book for people who like strong female characters – Kelly is a stereotypical ex wife desperate to retain custody of her son and prepared to fight dirty, Nora little more than a reserve love interest for Eph.
It’s a fast paced read that’s obviously written with a film adaptation in mind and while vampirism as disease isn’t a new idea, the spin on traditional vampiric lore is well handled and the set-up for the sequel is interesting enough for me to read the sequel.
The Verdict:
There isn’t anything particularly new here with regard to vampirism, but it is good to see them cast as villains for a change. The characters are little more than stereotypes and there’s a lot of repetition with regard to portrayal of symptoms and transformation, but the action is fast moving and the book ends with an interesting scenario that makes me want to read the sequel. It’s not classic horror, but it’s entertaining enough for a few hours.
In four weeks, the country.
In eight weeks ... the world.
At New York’s JFK Airport an arriving Boeing 777 taxis along a runway and suddenly stops dead. All the blinds have been drawn, all communications channels have mysteriously gone quiet. Dr Ephraim Goodweather – head of a rapid-response team investigating biological threats – boards the darkened plane ... and what he finds makes his blood run cold.
Meanwhile, in a pawnshop in Spanish Harlem, aged Holocaust survivor Abraham Setrakian knows that the war he has been dreading his entire life is finally here.
Before the next sundown Eph and Setrakian must undertake the ultimate fight for survival. A terrifying contagion has come to the unsuspecting city – hungry, merciless, lethal ... vampiric?
Dr Ephraim ‘Eph’ Goodweather heads up a CDC rapid response team in New York. A recovering alcoholic, he’s engaged in a custody battle with ex-wife, Kelly for his 11 year-old son Zack, and attracted to his beautiful, capable colleague, Nora Martinez.
Eph’s planned weekend with Zack is interrupted when a 777 lands at JFK Airport and suddenly stops on the runway. When its pilots fail to respond to air traffic control and there are no obvious signs of life within the plane itself, Eph’s team is called in to investigate. What they find is more chilling than any terrorist act or sudden epidemic – the passengers strapped into their seats are dead with only one survivor left in each of the three cabins.
As Eph tries to work out what has happened, he’s contacted by Abraham Setrakian, a Holocaust survivor who warns that both the survivors and the dead must be destroyed for they are vampires and if left unchecked, New York will fall to their infection ...
The first in a trilogy, Del Toro and Hogan portray vampirism as a parasite/disease, one that takes over the human carrier completely and which is used by a sinister master vampire to extend his influence and control. Although the plot centres around Eph and Abraham, there’s a wide cast of characters – from casual victims to relatives concerned at what’s happening to loved ones. That makes for a lot of repetition of symptoms and events and also makes it curiously difficult to sympathise with the main characters and their struggle to try and stop the disaster.
The characters themselves are stereotypes straight out of central casting – Eph is the stereotypical recovering alcoholic divorcee and devoted dad whose job just keeps getting in the way. Abraham is the wise old man who’s seen it all before and who alone knows how to fight an ancient enemy. This isn’t a book for people who like strong female characters – Kelly is a stereotypical ex wife desperate to retain custody of her son and prepared to fight dirty, Nora little more than a reserve love interest for Eph.
It’s a fast paced read that’s obviously written with a film adaptation in mind and while vampirism as disease isn’t a new idea, the spin on traditional vampiric lore is well handled and the set-up for the sequel is interesting enough for me to read the sequel.
The Verdict:
There isn’t anything particularly new here with regard to vampirism, but it is good to see them cast as villains for a change. The characters are little more than stereotypes and there’s a lot of repetition with regard to portrayal of symptoms and transformation, but the action is fast moving and the book ends with an interesting scenario that makes me want to read the sequel. It’s not classic horror, but it’s entertaining enough for a few hours.