Host: A Gripping Medical Thriller Novel - Perfect for Mystery Lovers & Book Club Discussions

A biased review from one who has read Robin Cook's every book and likely will continue to do so. As one trained in a technical field, I like his technical, yet human approach, as well as his superb novel writing technique, which always has us guessing. This book reminds me a little of his movie quality "Coma" but with today's technology. Along with advances in medical technology and biological research, of course, comes the chance of misuse by unscrupulous companies, in this case "Big Pharma" - whom Cook claims uses it's obscene profits, not as much for research, as they claim, but for the TV marketing we are bombarded with every day. This global company, run from Geneva, is making a killing, having found a way to use patients in the hospital it owns to cheaply produce a very expensive protein agent useful to treat several cancer type diseases. The set up they use to do this is a brilliant, but cruel combination of software and robotics. Cook has new woman-man team, replacing his popular pair of autopsy specialists. This pair is younger, top medical students with a flow of 4 letter words such as to embarrass a sailor (not my favorite of their otherwise admirable talents). Besides being top students, and curious enough to finally figure out the Big Pharma plot - and again reflecting today- this pair happens to be a black man and a white girl. This book would make a good movie in the vein of "Coma". It also calls for a sequel, since the Big Pharma, after laying low for a while, will be back, and two of the really bad guys will still be around, and our heroes are headed off to a residency in Boston. I think this book is one of Cook's best, and all his fans will probably love it, I did.