The thing about navel gazing is that it's only interesting to the person with the navel being gazed at.
This is a graphic memoir about a twenty-something woman who is mourning the death of a beloved uncle. She somehow connects ruins and dilapidated places with this loss, and the book is her working through all her feelings. The art is really good, but the book itself felt pointless, almost like a final project for her MFA. If not for the art I would have bailed on this one, so for the art alone I'll add an additional star. Rating: 2 stars.
110. Paper Girls, Vol. 1
I was excited to pick up this graphic novel series. The story centers around four 12-year old girls who have a paper route. It's Halloween, so you know things are going to get weird, but this weird I did not expect. The art is fun, but I was left confused as to what was going on with all the strange happenings. Hopefully things make more sense in future installments. Rating: 3 stars.
111. The Hot Zone: The Terrifying True Story of the Origins of the Ebola Virus
Narrative non-fiction is probably my favorite genre, so I was really looking forward to this one. An Ebola outbreak in Virginia? What? How did I not know about this? Where was the 24/7 media coverage on stuff that actually matters? Yes, I realize I'm getting of topic, so back to the book.
This book starts in Kenya, and takes you along on the experience of a person who is infected and dies in such a horrible manner that you certainly do not, under any circumstances, want to catch this disease. We are talking about Marburg and Ebola. We are introduced to various people, doctors, military personnel, and ordinary people who were affected and infected both in Kenya and the US. There's a monkey facility in Reston VA, and the monkeys suddenly start dying. What happens next is the stuff of horror movies, and that we are all even alive to read this review (or book) is pure luck.
This is a compelling story that is equal parts fascinating and horrifying. For the first several sections I thought I had found my next five star read, but then the author starts to meander. I didn't care about what people made for dinner, and learning about the pets they had at home didn't add to the story one bit. There were simply too many tangents that detracted from the urgency of the main event. The final sections where the author goes to Kenya to see for himself this cave which might be the source is simply gratuitous and annoyed me.
This is still a worth while read, and with tighter editing I would have rated it five stars. If nothing else it gave me lots to think about in terms of pandemics and the experiments carried out on animals. This book was first published in 1994 and I can only hope that we have better processes and systems in place to handle the next pandemic, which denial aside we know is coming.
I listened to the audiobook which is well narrated by Richard M. Davidson, and if you have not read about this event, this book would make an excellent entry point. Rating: 3 stars.
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