Rating: 
Summary: Great characters
Review: With "The Plague Tales," Ann Benson does a nice job of creating characters that drive the story, rather than vice-versa. If you're tired of plot-driven novels with thin, and often cliché, characters, then you're likely to dig this one. If you're into writers like Benson, Dan Brown, Katherine Neville, etc., then there's a new writer you should check out: GREG IPPOLITO. His most recent novel, "Zero Station," is a politically charged page-turner that pits its main Gen X character (John Saylor) against his Baby Boomer parents, teachers, etc., during the winter of 1991 -- in the heart of the Persian Gulf War. Right now, Ippolito is still a relative unknown (a friend turned me onto his work)...but this is a must-read. You can check him out and read an excerpt at: http://www.zero-station.net Don't miss it.
Rating:
Summary: deja vu? hope not!
Review: With the background buzz of bioterror fears nowadays, the biocop world Benson describes is all too believable. The medical disaster unfolding in not-too-future England is drenched with 14th-century foreboding as the plague advances on an unprepared Europe, with a bit of hereditary mystic-medicine to link the two time zones in terror and hope. What's really scary is how hyper-vigilant "modern" society has become, yet the bug is unleashed despite all best efforts. Cool story.
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