Rating: 
Summary: Good Despite the Flaws
Review: The ideas presented in The Cobra Event are both timely and horrifying. Its unfortunate that the book is poorly written.Preston has a gift for explaining the complex concepts of bio-warfare, forensics and biology to the layman. But Preston doesn't know when he's the voice of the narrator and when he's the teacher. Throughout The Cobra Event, he interjects explanatory sentences and paragraphs. While this helps the reader, it doesn't do much for the flow of the story. It feels as if he's constantly shifting points of view and the book becomes inconsistent in parts. However, as I mentioned, these explanations are needed and very helpful. I only wish he had found another way to incorporate them without disrupting the flow of the story. Preston doesn't manage to handle his characters well either. There's not one character in the book that could be considered well developed. That said, you don't typically expect perfect character development in a novel like this. Regardless of all the flaws, this is a very interesting novel. Its not perfect but its worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: SCARY STUFF: A REACTION
Review: The Sept 11th disaster, which only happened about 5 blocks from where I work, was so scary as to the fact that so many people are packed into these buildings and there would be little if no time to escape a terrorist event, should it occur.
Which brings me to THE COBRA EVENT, a novel about a lunatic who creates a powerful virus in his home lab and unleashes it onto New York City. As the victims start dying with the same symptoms, the CDC is called in to isolate and determine where the virus is originating from. A great mystery is laid out for us, and the man hunt was on with break neck speed.
But, this is a scary book, for the fact that if you've never been to the NYC Subway system, you would have no idea how crowded it gets and how vulnerable we all are. Some would say, don't work or live in NYC if you are scared, but remember a terrorist will find an easier target where the world isn't watching...like your home town for instance.
But I say hogwash, because if you believe that then the bad guys have won. But regardless this is a Good novel.
Rating:
Summary: A chilling warning by flat characters
Review: Preston's story, written in 1997, is an impressive warning against the use of biological weapons, especially in the light of the September 11th ... attacks in New York. Through many interviews with the F.B.I. and the Centers of Disease Control (CDC), Preston is extremely well informed about the technological details of "black biology". The story is pretty exciting, very fast, takes place all over the world and is very clearly written. The scenes were Austen encounters the first victims of self-cannibalization and -enucleation (removing of one's own eye) are toe curling. However, and this is perhaps caused by Preston's non-fiction background, the novel is not nearly as gripping as is could be. Why? Because his characters have the complexity of an empty petri dish. For instance, the romance between two of the main personalities doesn't develop further than that "they had stopped seeing each other in a purely professional way". In the book there are hardly any emotional developments. In addition, some situations were somewhat unlikely, like the coincidental spotting of the Cope lab, and overall, the story never really escapes the so much used virus-outbreak-CDC-hero-story format, but I guess, things would actually develop like that with an outbreak in real life. A chilling warning remains not to underestimate evil people making dangerous bugs.
Rating:
Summary: You'll never use a public toilet again.
Review: Eewwwwwww! Ok, now that we've gotten that out of the way, I'd like to point out that there are two interleaved books in here. The first is an excellent techno thriller primarily concerned with the effects of a highly-infectious disease breaking out in New York City. Attempts to locate the source indicate that it's being spread deliberately and the search is on. Interspersed throughout the pages of this novel are other pages, which although ostensibly there to provide background, are in fact a whole bunch of really, really scary true facts. Your job is to read the book while using your browser to look up anything that seems mildly factual. This "second" book is a history of recent activities in biowarfare, esp. by Iran and Russia/USSR. Tonnes of anthrax? Really? Yep. You say you had a smallpox vaccination? Too bad they wear off in twenty years. You're going to need one. Both books are well put together with a style similar to Preston's _Hot Zone_, a narrative history of the Ebola outbreak in a monkey house in Reston, VA. If you've already read HZ, then this book will be much, much creepier than otherwise, since you'll have a better idea about the plausibility of the plot. The style is the now common multi-threaded plot, but it's not so dense that you need to take notes.
Rating:
Summary: Scary stuff
Review: At first I was skeptical of Preston's work, coming after the non-fiction thriller The Hot Zone. But he has taken the thinking to the next level, and imagined how things could progress. His scenario is kept rooted in reality, both in terms of how it comes about and how the course of action goes. The story keeps an even tone, never flying off into hysterics or creating the doomsday scenario. Rather, we are shown a scary "what if?" that is all too possible; a terror made even more real after the anthrax letters scare. Well researched and plotted the story compels you forward. If there is a weakness, it is in the characters. They are pretty uniformly throwaways. You never really care that much about the characters, especially considering that they are dancing on the edge of death through the whole story. They are just there, so the germs are really the most fleshed out character. I would not mind seeing a sequel picking up off of what was learned and the next crisis, but I wouldn't care if the (surviving) characters were back, or it was a new batch.
Rating: 
Summary: Frightening bioterrorism manifesto
Review: Superbly researched and detailed account of a fictionalized biologic attack on the U.S. by a lone terrorist using a genetically manufactured "killer" virus. Admixed within the story were excerpts describing the basic concepts of biologic warfare research as conducted in countries such as Iraq, Russia and the U.S. The story is seen throught the eyes of Alice Austen, a doctor working as as epidemiologist for the Center for Disease Control. She is drawn into the intrigue created by a seeingly unrelated outbreak of a deadly unknown virus in a 17 year old affluent high school student and a nameless homeless man. Eventually it is determined, through the intervention of the FBI, that someone has created a lethal virus, is testing it using human guinea pigs and is preparing to release it among the general population. This bioterrorist, who calls himself Archimedes must be uncovered and stopped. In our increasing paranoic age of terrorism, this book should be required reading for all officials concerned with homeland protection. The alarming threat of bioterrorism seems very real and unfortunately almost inevitable.
Rating:
Summary: A hypochondriac's worst nightmare
Review: If you like "The Hot Zone", you will really like this book. It is Richard Preston's first attempt at fiction and it is a good one.
When President Clinton read this book, he called the NSA to ask them if the plot in this book was possible. Want to know what the scary part is. It is.
Preston was smart enought to make the story about the events and not the characters, which for this book was the right move.
Rating:
Summary: This book is not optional. You must read it.
Review: I can understand why this book frightened President Clinton. The storyline of a genetically engineered viral biological weapon is simply horrifying not only because of how Preston masterfully portrays its gruesome effects, but because this technology actually exists! The historical background he gives (of Soviet, US, and Iraqi biological weapons programs) is truly mind boggling with its implications for our present-day world. I felt that I was very up-to-date on biological weapons before reading this book but I learned several facts in this book about Iraq's development of biological agents that are just chilling.
First read "The Hot Zone", and then read this.
Rating:
Summary: The Cobra Event
Review: This is a story about a C.D.C.(Center for Disease Control) agent, Alice Austen, an FBI agent, Mark Littleberry, and a crazed scientist. It begins when a teenage girl in New York, suffers a terrifying seizure and goes into a mode of self-cannibalization before she dies. This causes Alice Austen to be requested to search for the cause of this death. While she is searching New York trying to discover more clues about this odd case she discovers a few more cases very similar to the first one. These cases cause the FBI to get involved for fear of a dramatic terrorist attack. This is where Alice Austen meets Mark Littleberry; they will be 2 of the leader of the operation to discover and stop whoever is causing these terrible outbreaks. The search leads to the climactic chase through old, abandoned subway tunnels. The author draws the reader in with incredible details of seizures, autopsies, chases and standoffs. The only thing that disappointed me was that, time between the major events in the story seemed to drag on and be boring. Also, some things seemed a little unrealistic, such as, when the terrorist, "Archimedes", gets fired from his job, he steals a bioreactor from that business, yet the company doesn't try to get it back even thought they know he stole it. Although, the climactic chase through the New York subway tunnel system, was wonderfully written. The book is great, but it's not for everyone. Unfortunately, I expected this book to be much more then it was. If you like suspense, and enjoy graphic descriptions of gore, you'll like this book.
Rating:
Summary: An enjoyable Bio-thriller
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed this book as I did Preston's earlier work, Hot Zone. I just re-read this in light of the 9/11 events--and it was even more chilling. Preston mixes in a lot of very interesting basics on bioterrorism with the plot--leaving the reader with both an enjoyable story and fascinating facts. The plot is pretty straightforward and the characters believable. The story plays out like a horror novel with subtle violence (at the cellular level). If you are even remotely interested in infectious diseases this would be an enjoyable read. If you are interested in the governmental bureaucracy that would be in place for events like the recent anthrax events--you will also enjoy this book.
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