This is a fantastic book! Please note that because it's signed by the author (hooray!) I can't release it into the wild for sentimental reasons. Malcolm Rose also writes crime stories, but this is good too. It's set in Milton Keynes (UK) which is a very modern town full of straight roads and roundabouts. The plot is that a deadly virus has somehow found its way into the suburbs of the town, and is causing people to bleed to death. Grusome and descriptive, this book is an excellent read. Not for the faint-hearted.

------ WELCOME TO THE 'PLAGUE' INTERNATIONAL BOOK RING ------

This ring is now underway!

Members are as follows - member in bold currently has possession of the book: (If you wish to join, please PM me and I will add you!):

MEMBER / LOCATION:

angi612uk / Norfolk UK
rahar109 / Hampshire UK
Caro1 / Nottingham UK
tehuti / Nottingham UK
Travelling to...
dodau / Bristol UK
GRAN-DUCATO / Chile
Moimeme / Tasmania

This is how it works:
 If you wish to be added to the list, please PM me with your details.
 Note that you must be prepared to mail internationally.
 We will kick off once we have 5 members.
 You will be sending the book to the person who appears after you in the list, so you need to PM them to get their address!
 It's not a race, but please read and send the book on as speedily as you can, other people are dying to read it too.
 Please journal the book once you have received it (so we all know where it currently is) and again when you have read it (so we know what you thought of it!)
 If you're the last person on the list (i.e. we run out of members) the book comes back to me until there are more interested parties...

_______________________________________

RELEASE NOTES:

Send via mail to first bookring participant angi912uk. There's a letter in the envelope.

PS: Postmen, if you find this, register that you found it and then pass it on to the next participant! :D

Plopped on my doormat this morning thank you mantolwen! As luck would have it I've jsust finished M is for Malice so will be starting this straight away. I will PM rahar for his/her address.

It's not the sort of book I would seek out to read so thank you Mantolwen for giving me the chance to read it.
It gives a very good case for using animals in medical research but I guess the animal rights activists won't be swayed! It's certainly not for the faint-hearted! It paints a gruesome picture of what could happen anywhere in the world.

I've got rahar109's address so it will be moving on to her, Monday or Tuesday.

On its way now to rahar109.

arrived in the post this morning, thank you.

Arrived safely today along with a notelet, postcard and, yum, yum, a bar of G & B Maya Gold chocolate!! Looking forward to reading this, but with another 3 rings before it, I probably won't be starting it until the end of next week. I'm a fast reader though, so no problem!

In a hospital a man lies dying in the most horrific pain, he is leaking blood. Not from a bullet or knife, but from a virus. It has happened before in Zaire, but this is not Zaire, this is Britain and it's spreading fast.

Read this in a couple of hours whilst sitting out in the garden. By the time I finished I was flinching every time a greenfly landed on me or a bird flew over. Plague reminded me in lots of ways of the film Outbreak and the book The Hot Zone by Richard Preston, but setting the story in Milton Keynes brought it closer to home, literally! This provided an entertaining break (albeit in a very gruesome fashion) from other more weighty tomes in my TBR pile. Thanks for sharing Mantolwen.

Posting to tehuti tomorrow, June 22.

Wonderful bookmark inside plus cards. It's nice to have little mementoes from previous readers to look at. And thank you for the choccie, Caro1 :)

The story is a gripping account of what could happen now that a disease-causing organism can hitch a plane ride to anywhere in the world. This particularly beastie decides to wreak havoc in Milton Keynes. Malcolm Rose catches the breadth as well as the detail of all the various measures and resources that have to be coordinated in such an emergency, as well as the different reactions of the people caught up in it. To that extent, it is an exciting read, and satisfying also when some fairly obnoxous people get their come-uppance. However, I'm afraid I had to mark down my rating a lot because Mr Rose falls down very, very badly on the science. Unfortunately, I have a PhD in immunology and experience of research in the field, and I came close to tearing my hair out in places! The author really needed to consult with someone who has some knowledge of the field. There were some very dodgy descriptions of the immune response obviously arising from a misreading of popular scientific articles. Also, viruses do not writhe and swim around under the microscope. They do not have the facility to move around under their own propulsion. My greatest argument, however, is with the description of how a dedicated scientist finds a miracle cure through a series of animal studies in mice and monkeys that are conceived, started and finished in the space of a few weeks, not to mention how her laboratory is miraculously upgraded to Category 4 biosafety within a couple of days!! Sorry, but science just doesn't work like that and neither do the laws that regulate the use of experimental animals and of human subjects in biomedical research!

Off to dodau

Arrived safely this morning with lots of bits inside. Will read over the weekend hopefully.

This was a childrens book so it was quick and easy to read. Some of the characters were a bit thin and the setting and back story a little cliched but I did enjoy it.

RELEASE NOTES:

This came back to me today. From what I can make out, as it was the Chilean PO that rejected it, the envelope was damaged. I will pm the next person and send it again.

RELEASE NOTES: