Contagion
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Average rating4
This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a scream.
High above the Arctic Circle, a team of archeologists discovers a burial site dating to the last ice age. None of them notice the warning carved into the entrance or realize that the tomb has been deliberately sealed from the outside until they’ve inadvertently released a virus that turns ordinary people into violent monsters.
The deadly contagion spreads like wildfire, forcing the military to quarantine entire cities in the hope of slowing the spread and buying scientists enough time to develop a cure. Desperate to escape before it’s too late, the immune must brave streets swarming with the infected and prepare themselves for the fight of their lives.
For there was something even more terrifying than a virus trapped inside that tomb...something ancient...something unspeakably evil, and it’s up to a ragtag group of survivors to band together and stand against it.
If they can survive long enough to do so.
Series
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3 primary books#1 in Viral Apocalypse
Viral Apocalypse is a 3-book series with 3 released primary works first released in 2022 with contributions by Michael McBride.
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LOTS Of Moving Parts. This is one of those longer books at 634 pages with a LOT of moving parts that can be difficult to track at times - but which it is hard to say that McBride could have separated into two books at any given point. MAYBE by separating out some of the individual threads into two separate yet concurrent 300 ish page books? Yet I struggle to think that the tale would be so compelling without seeing all that is happening at once.
Essentially this is the tale of the beginning of the Apocalypse, and McBride makes it clear in his author's note that a major inspiration was The Stand (which believe it or not, I've never read). Another somewhat similar story that I drew several parallels with from one of McBride's contemporaries is the Project Eden series by Brett Battles, which I've noted for years was the best full series I've yet read.
Here, McBride begins to make his case to take that title, and despite the length here and just how many individual threads are all going on... he absolutely makes a strong opening statement. By the end of this book, it is quite clear that this particular tale setting up the Apocalypse and showing how it began is complete... and yet it is also quite clear that several threads will be left for subsequent books and at least a few of them are likely to not be resolved until the final book of this series, whenever that may be. Very much recommended.
