Pandemic by Robin Cook

Pandemic by Robin Cook

Book review

Genre Medical Thriller

Rating 4/5

Mild spoilers without any major reveal which would upset the serious reader!!

This one is special because it’s the first novel I finished this year! And it’s just the second day of the year!

Last year I finished close to 50 fiction and non-fiction novels and this looks like a good start!

Just some months back I had read Charlatans by Robin Cook and here we are with another book all ready to roll! This itself deserves accolades since I have been struggling with writing a novel for three years now and Robin at his age is churning out novels like a paper mill churns out books!!

So in this one the famous Jack Stapleton returns which is needed because the chief protagonist of his last three novels had not met with a to be continued fate!(thats mild spoiler only for the previous novels like Nano or Charlatans!)

With his trademark style of getting into everyone’s nerves and skin, Jack is an irritating but apparently talented forensic pathologist and the protagonist of many of Robin Cook’s novels in the past. The story in most of these would usually by excessive killing and a surprise negative character which more often than not turns out to be a woman!

In the present time which is this book, there are lots of grey areas and it’s anyone’s guess what the ending is! ( No spoiler here also!)

This is the day and age of Murakami or Black mirror or even closer to home like the movie Andhadhun! The ambiguous nature of ending! You don’t get the answers raised in the book! You don’t get to know what happens in the end! Since there is no end! Apparently they have really taken Pink Floyd catch phrase to heart! Which one you say!?; The show must go on!!…..

CRISPR/CAS….. This is the catch phrase of this book though! You will get this very often in the book so get ready for it!

So what to expect in this one!…

The over-enthusiastic, sarcastic, brash forensic pathologist Jack who by a wierd coincidence gets some juicy cases for autopsy!! ( Read apparent index case of an apparent outbreak!).

The amount of free time this guy has to snoop around like a detective like the hardy boys! No one cares so much in this day and age buddy! Get a life!

The subtle references to autism and vaccine and the two viewpoints! (Minor spoiler!)

The fact that cycling is good! (Only chief point Robin and I agree on!!)

The final showdown which is eerily similar to many of Jack Stapleton’s showdowns in most of his novels!

Only difference is the ambiguous nature of the ending! Though the family finally stuck together!

All in all a great attempt by Robin Cook so much so that I could not rest until I completed this one!!

And yeah the book is about a pandemic! Didn’t you get that already!!!??