"Patient Zero," Jonathan Maberry, 2009

Patient Zero, Jonathan Maberry, 2009  (No Spoilers)

A couple of months ago, I attended a writers’ conference.  Like many such events, there were tables staffed by people from local bookstores (yes… actual, local bookstores!).  I was minding my own business, just looking things over when a complete stranger pointed at this book and said, “You should buy that one.  It’s the first Joe Ledger novel, and it’s great.”

I’m glad I took a chance on it.

This is first-and-foremost a high-energy, thriller.  It is delightfully cross-genre, sort of a Harry Dresden joins the Delta Force to battle the Zombie Apocalypse story.  Oh, and there’s a little bit of Philip Marlowe in there too.  

Yeah, I know.  But it really works.  

Maberry’s prose is tight.  The book is filled with distinct characters who are, for the most part, drawn very well.  Character nuances provide interest and keep away the worst of the cookie-cutter aspects that we so frequently encounter in good-versus-evil thrillers.  The action is nonstop, but it doesn’t ever get so relentless as to be boring or wearing.  I had to force myself to set the book aside so I wouldn’t gobble it up in one sitting.

I think you should check it out.  It’d make a heck-of-a blockbuster film.  Warning: there is violence, quite a bit of it, in this novel.