The Virus by Stanley Johnson

3.0 out of 5 stars -- When a 19-year-old student, Diane Verusio, returns to New York from Brussels and expires in isolation at Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital, she speaks only the words, "green monkeys" before she dies. Dr. Lowell Kaplan from the CDC is dispatched from Atlanta to track down the identity, the origin and the transmission of her mysterious illness. After Dr. Kaplan speaks to Diane's family physician, Dr. Isaac Rueben, who himself becomes ill, Kaplan is on a time sensitive mission to stop the spread of this lethal virus and his efforts take him to Germany and to Africa.

This would have been a more enjoyable medical thriller IF the storyline and the science wasn't so dated. Since the recent outbreak of Ebola made headlines, and with all the information the public now understands about the Filoviridae, this plot line about a related virus, the Marburg virus, bordered on gross inaccuracy and strained credulity. For all that, it was a fast paced and entertaining read once I stopped fact checking on the internet and just pretended that Dr. Kaplan, head epidemiologist at the CDC (should be corrected in this book as United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), was investigating a potential outbreak of some new strain.

I love medical thrillers and will almost always take a chance whenever I have the opportunity. Thank you to Edelweiss for the ARC e-book to review.