Spasm
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3.7 • 3 Ratings
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- $16.99
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
From Robin Cook, the ‘master of the medical thriller’ (The New York Times), fan favourites Jack and Laurie return in another fast-paced story about a deadly bioweapon that could disrupt the world order as they know it.
When Laurie Montgomery temporarily steps down from her position as Chief Medical Examiner at the OCME to get a break from office politics, she and Jack decide to embark on a weekend getaway. And the timing couldn’t be better when they receive a call from Jack’s old peer, Robert Neilson MD, about two strange deaths and their potential association with the upswing in Alzheimer’s cases in Essex Falls. Deciding this is just what the doctor ordered, Laurie and Jack agree to help, and head upstate.
But Essex Falls is far from the rural idyllic town of their imagination. It’s apparent that most of the residents are earnest in their undying wish to return America back to the 1950s. Robert tells them the deaths are of two troublemakers, known to be white extremists, in their late twenties. Prior to their deaths, their behaviour had been somewhat bizarre, with both complaining of muscle spasms, nausea and off-the-charts anxiety.
As Jack and Laurie get to work, they are led to believe that a dangerous bioweapon might be at play, which, in the wrong hands, could threaten the lives of the entire town . . . and maybe all of America.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The limp latest installment of Cook's long-running Jack Stapleton and Laurie Montgomery series (after Manner of Death) is more of the same. The action kicks off with married medical examiners Jack and Laurie receiving a call from Bob Nielson, their former med school colleague, who works as the coroner for the small town of Essex Falls in Upstate New York. He needs help with a bizarre case: Essex Falls exterminator Ethan Jameson, founder of a right-wing militia called the Diehard Patriots, died by poisoning while preparing to welcome four Russian recruits to his cause. Though Nielson first chalks up Jameson's death to toxins he encountered on the job, an autopsy reveals a baffling chemical profile that he's never seen before. Jack and Laurie arrive to help Nielson investigate, and soon unravel a conspiracy involving a bioweapon that appears to induce dementia. While Cook holds back a handful of reveals for the climax, he gives up the bulk of the mystery too early, draining tension from the proceedings. Muddy prose (Jack sits on a staircase with "a moderate sense of acceptance and resolve tinged with appropriate fear") doesn't help. Even the author's fans might want to skip this one.
