Plague Ship ebook

Buried deep under the Andes mountains of Peru, an 5000-year-old plague waits to unleashed upon an unsuspecting world.

When Dr. Grant Reed is summoned to the medical relief ship Mercy, docked for repairs at Chimbote, Peru, to ascertain what might be wrong with his dying brother, he initially has no idea that the culprit is a virulent germ from the distant past. But as more and more people in the region are infected, it soon becomes clear that he's dealing with an epidemic.

Written over thirty years ago, Plague Ship is a medical thriller from a previous generation. Slaughter does an excellent job of communicating through fiction the medical realities of his day, though many of the processes and technologies described in the book have changed over the decades. The narrative reflects an older style as well, with more emphasis on describing events and surroundings than on drawing the reader into the scene. The book does contain some mild language and a few sex scenes, though interestingly all the romance is based on the foundational idea that marriage is the eventual and inevitable conclusion of a successful relationship--more evidence that this book is from a different era.

In an age of global concern about the possibility (or certainty) of a future pandemic similar to pandemics that have ravaged human populations in the past, a thirty-plus-year-old book about an ancient plague serves as a reminder that these fears are nothing new. Whether it's swine flu, avian flu, malaria, or the fictional Yungay fever, history teaches us that we are susceptible to illness on a global scale. Plague Ship is a generation-old testament to human frailty on a number of fronts.

An ancient plague released upon the world is the premise of this disappointing story. Dr. Slaughter uses his medical knowledge to advantage and for the first two thirds of the book, holds the readers attention with how a deadly disease spreads from its initial introduction into 20th century South America to a world wide pandemic. Two problems detract from the story, however. Without giving anything significant away, with literally 10% of the book to go, the hero is on a ship heading into a cyclone, the disease is spreading throughout the world with no cure in sight, and mutineers are stirring. Trying to bring the story to a believable conclusion from this point, in only a few pages, was more than the author could handle. The numerous plot holes provided the other flaw. A character who, by his thoughtlessness and criminal actions, probably caused the deaths of thousands, is treated at book's end as if he had done nothing even morally wrong. There are other examples but what's the point?
Slaughter provides an easy read with Plague Ship and I will try another by him in the hopes that in that story, he will get it right.

An intriguing idea - an ancient plague released from an archeological excavation in South America. Unfortunately, the story develops EVER so slowly. Although the science is well written,the ensuing improvements in immunoscience since this book was written really expose the age of this story. Although it is interesting to hear how easily a disease could be spread across the globe, the story is too driven by the main character while not enough detail concerns other related events. Just as the story starts reaching a climax, all detail is spared and these events are given very little treatment. I am sure that there are more recent novels concerning this topic that better combine the elements of science, action, and public health policy. In addition, the audiobook version of this novel is of extremely poor quality. Numerous times the performer made a pronunciation error but apparently no effort was made to edit that segment.My advice - do not set sail on "The Plague Ship".

It is an entertaining book with interesting characters. The medical aspects were dense at times but I thouroughly enjoyed reading it.

This is a compilation of five of Frank G. Slaughter's books. Included are: "The Casa Yanqui", "The Microbe", "Adrift", "The Storm", and "The Galapagos".