Slightly over-egged. The author knows that he has an interesting subject, but also that he doesn't actually have that much material. It all happened a long time ago, and nothing happened anyway, otherwise we'd have all remembered it/lived with it so he spends a lot of time on extraneous details. These do add colour and depth to the personalities and scenes involved, but detract from any drama and tension.

As a caver I didn't get a good sense of the african cave scenes. Seems like an interesting area with potential! There's also quite a bit of anthropomorphising of the virus. Although he mostly remembers to put quotes around the "wants" "needs" "desires" etc, he still frequently seems to imply agency to virus particles, and they really are nothing more than code - capable of astonishing things when all their prerequires are met, but without any option of bringing those conditions about.

Given the world's preocupation with viruses in general it's still a timely reminder of just how close to the knife edge we are actually walking. ( )

Preston's history about the ebola virus reads like science fiction, and that makes it frightening. Very accessible, very interesting, very gripping, very timely with the current news. I enjoyed it a lot. ( )

worth a reread after ebola outbreaks in West Africa in 2014-15 ( )

Zona caliente es uno de los thrillers ms escalofriantes de los ltimos tiempos salvo por un detalle: todo lo que aqu se cuenta sucedi en verdad. La 'zona caliente' es el recinto de mxima seguridad y aislamiento donde los especialistas del Ejrcito de los Estados Unidos manipulan los virus ms mortferos que se conocen. No hace mucho, en las afueras de Washington, slo una operacin militar secreta pudo detener la propagacin de un filovirus asesino entre centenares de monos de laboratorio.Este libro extraordinario revela la seria amenaza que - como lo demostr el vrus Ebola - se cierne sobre el mundo actual. Zona caliente es un testimonio sensacional que demuestra como la realidad puede superar a la mejor ficcin.

This may be the scariest book I've ever read. Seriously.

By comparison, it makes [b:House of Leaves|24800|House of Leaves|Mark Z. Danielewski|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1403889034s/24800.jpg|856555] read like a fairy tale. Because this book is actually true, the hypotheses within could actually happen. It doesn't take much imagination to envision the consequences of a contagious killer virus.

Preston enumerates the initial case of Ebola and then traces forward to an outbreak of it in a monkey research facility in Reston, Virginia. Part horror, part medical mystery, and all true, The Hot Zone makes you realize how vulnerable the human race really could be. Imagine an illness that kills like the black plague and spreads like the flu. What happens if a virus like that gets out in the population?

This book definitely is written with dramatic flair, and perhaps at points is a little over the top, but that is what makes it such a fantastic and accessible read.
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