Rating: 
Summary: A Chilling Mastery, A Horrific Threat...
Review: Since I initially read and reviewed THE DEMON IN THE FREEZER back in November 2002, the specter of war in Iraq has continued to spotlight just how prophetic Preston's work is. Yet, as I've mentioned in radio and television interviews on my own novel of bioterrorism, the untold story of this horrific subject remains the distinct possibility that the current smallpox vaccine may not be effective against the bioengineered strain of variola most likely in the hands of rogue nations and, potentially, terrorist groups. We are indeed in danger of experienceing the final epidemic. This, despite the fact that Richard Preston detailed the danger of an engineered smallpox strain (most likely, a legacy of the massive Soviet bioweapon program) in DEMON. In the eleven months I spent researching my novel of bioterrorism, ..., I interviewed dozens of experts in biological weapons, terrorism and medicine. And everywhere I went, I found myself following the footprints of Richard Preston, whose knowledge and professionalism sets the standard in writing about this dark subject. Preston's a hard act to follow-- particularly so because his latest book, The Demon In The Freezer, is all so terribly true. Written in an episodic style, the book has the feel of a journal, albeit one written by a man quietly horrified by the revelations he records. The book centers around the high probability --so high as to constitute a virtual certainity-- of what itself is a horrifying fact: that the variola virus --smallpox, history's greatest mass murderer of humanity-- has come back from its official eradication as a disease in the mid-'70s to emerge today as a biological weapon possessed by a number of rogue states (most likely among them, Iraq) and potentially accessable to fanatical terrorists driven by a hatred of Western society. Preston builds his case through a narrative based on interviews with experts --perhaps the most disturbing, an almost pastoral description of a meeting between Ken Alibeck (who defected from the Soviet bioweapon program, which produced weaponized smallpox by the metric ton and for whom Alibeck invented a particularly lethal variant of anthrax) and former U.S. biowarrior Bill Patrick at the latter's Maryland home. Here, Preston records how the pair chat about mega-death and the ease of bioweapon delivery, even to the point of Patrick using a mundane garden sprayer to send a plume of simulated bio-agent into the gentle breeze, which he posits will carry it to a major urban center within hours. In my other reviews on this subject (Alibeck's BIOHAZARD, for instance) I've already expressed my jaw-dropping astonishment at the appallingly casual attitude so often in evidence among the former high priests of biowarfare. Never has it been portrayed so revealingly as it is in Preston's account. But anthrax, lethal though it may be, is incapable of human-to-human contagion; as such, it becomes only a subnote in "Demon." Always, Preston returns to the real threat: the virtual certainity that a genetically-engineered version of smallpox has been developed-- a variant that is unaffected by any existing vaccine and which has been further tweaked to enhance its ability to kill. Not only does Preston tell us how this viral monster has probably been created, he lets us follow him to a modest laboratory. Here, a bio-geneticist allows Preston to participate in an almost-identical gene-splicing process involving mousepox virus, a cousin of smallpox. A reasonably bright high-school student could do the same, if he had access to mousepox... or smallpox. The genie has indeed escaped the bottle, and awaits only a monster to make the first wish to bring on the Final Epidemic of our nightmares. "The Demon In The Freezer" recounts a mounting litany of horror, phrased in Preston's always calm style, and includes the author's own reaction to such events as the World Trade Center attacks, the subsequent anthrax-in-the-mail terrorism, even to today's probability of war in Iraq. And then the book ends, as abruptly as a sharp intake of breath. Wisely, Preston does not attempt a profound summation, for he had already known what his readers now realize. Doomsday viruses are in the hands of the ruthless and possibly the insane; the survival of humanity teeters in tentative balance. As we wait, in a justified fear Preston has documented so well. --Earl Merkel
Author
Rating: 
Summary: Richard Preston has another winner on his hands
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed reading Mr. Preston's latest book, and I finished it in less than a week's time which is saying something for a person with my schedule. Mr. Preston, as always, does an incredible job of captivating the reader as he recounts tales from the world of dark biology. Due to the current world situation, his information about smallpox is extremely valuable, and should help convince the few stalwarts left in America who mistakenly believe that Iraq does not have biology weapons. "Demon in the Freezer" is perhaps this year's best horror non-fiction title; you WILL have to read it with the light on. As a supplemental read, be sure to pick up Dr. Ken Alibek's book, "Biohazard."
Rating:
Summary: We have much more to fear than fear itself...
Review: Considering the past few months' debate about Weapon's of Mass Destruction, The Demon in the Freezer is a MUST READ. Mr. Preston puts a very human face on the scientists working to protect us and the book moves along quickly from incident to incident. It is the living viruses both natural and modified that are extremely fascinating: their history and their potential threat. In the context of today's world Mankind is playing a dangerous game: I haven't been this fearful about the fate of our species since the coldest days of the Cold War in the early 1960's.
Rating:
Summary: Preston succeeds again
Review: Richard Preston has the uncanny ability to make the complex understandable. This book is scarier than The Hot Zone and deals with an even more lethal disease - smallpox. He takes you through the efforts of the eradicators who successfully eliminated this horrible virus from the wild up to today and the threat that smallpox could pose to an unprepared human race. His writing style is engaging and the pages MUST keep turning as he lays out the risks we face with this disease. Extremely well written. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Chilling Reality
Review: If you think what you've heard on the news about smallpox is scary, you don't want to listen to this audiobook. Richard Preston provides a very detailed description of the varieties of smallpox & anthrax - its symptoms, disfigurements, and various paths to death-in highly graphic language. Preston argues that, to believe that smallbox is not held elsewhere is nonsense. A lot of time is spent on the the anthrax attacks of 2001. He believes that smallpox, which has killed more people than any other infectious disease, is the greatest biological threat facing humanity. Preston relates the history of smallpox from 1000 B.C. to the outbreaks in the 1970s. He goes into great detail about the World Health Organization's campaign to eradicate it and the lost opportunity to destroy it forever. His final chapter introduces the idea of genetically modified smallpox that might be resistant not only to vaccines, but also to acquired immunity. The author draws readers into his narrative by humanizing his facts; researchers, WHO workers, and smallpox victims relay parts of this vivid and alarming story. This isn't something that you want to listen to on a full stomach.
Rating:
Summary: The Demon⿦
Review: This is the sort of book that you just cannot put down. I started reading it on a long car ride home from Portland and was hooked immediately. After telling a co-worker that I had enjoyed Preston's “THE HOT ZONE†she recommended this book as a follow-up. While I did enjoy it, I found the chapters about Anthrax boring in comparisson to the terror of smallpox and the fascinating story of its eradication. “THE HOT ZONE†and Laurie Garrett's “THE COMING PLAGUE†(which I am currently in the middle of) are better, but this is an enjoyable read that is full of facts ot keep biology/pathology buffs hooked but not bogged down with technical jargon.
Rating: 
Summary: The Demon in the Freezer book review
Review: I really liked the book. As a fan of Richard Preston's books, I very much so enjoyed The Demon in the Freezer. Although it wasn't on the same level as The Hot Zone, I still found myself unable to put it down until the very end.
If you have read The Hot Zone and enjoyed that, you will most likely enjoy this book as well. I highly recommend it to anyone. And if you like this book I also suggest The Cobra Event.
Rating:
Summary: Informative...
Review: The Demon in the Freezer is the informative and interesting tale of the eradication of smallpox. The book describes the techniques used to rid the world of this horrible disease and its eventual location in just two high security freezers worldwide. The reader is introduced to some of the most brilliant minds in science and reads about their reactions as their worst fears come true. It is revealed that smallpox, "the demon", may be present in more than two locations and if it were to be "set loose", its consequences would be devastating.
While The Demon is an informative book full of science and medical discovery, it includes too much unneeded description to be extraordinarily thrilling. Do we really need to know what color sweater Karl Heinz Richter was wearing on the 16th of January, 1970? Will that really add to our knowledge of bioweapons and scientific triumphs? No.
This book was meant to be a doomsday type of thriller. It was meant to make the reader think more about what is really going on around them. In reading this book, I did gain a great deal of knowledge about smallpox and other occurances in that area of science. However, I'm not necessarily more concerned with the prospects of it "getting loose" and killing everyone any more than I was before. I would suggest this book for anyone interested in the topics of medical science and biological weapons, however, this book is not necessarily for everyone.
Rating:
Summary: A Cytokine Storm
Review: Those of us who are old enough remember getting a shot in the arm when we were kids, a shot that made a huge sore that hurt like hell and left us with a quarter-sized scar that has stuck with us for life. These were our smallpox vaccinations, and for most of us, this was just another vaccination in a series of vaccinations we had to get because our parents made us. We later learned that entire American Indian populations had been wiped out by smallpox once the Europeans had introduced it to the new world. Smallpox hadn't existed in the Western Hemisphere before-Indians had no natural resistance to it-so they suffered horribly from the disease. This is what we were taught, but we were left with the impression that smallpox was really of little concern to us. We weren't taught that smallpox had been a devastating scourge of mankind for thousands of years, and that for many, contracting smallpox meant a slow, painful death.
Richard Preston has written another great biological who-done-it in the same swift, hard-hitting style of The Hot Zone. The Demon in the Freezer is constructed like a suspense novel; it reads very well, and the story moves along at a good clip while exposing or documenting the bio-warfare research surrounding smallpox. Anthrax and Ebola even make an appearance, their own stories prove to be disconcertingly woven within the smallpox saga.
In contrast to the Bio-weaponeers are the Eradicators, those teams of docs and biologists who stamped out smallpox in the 1970s. Their monumental work is all but forgotten by the lay public, and they never received any awards or prizes for their work. I think that one of Preston's main motivations for writing this book was probably to provide some recognition for the courage and determination of the Smallpox Eradication Teams. Their work has saved 2 million lives a year since the 1970s-they should at least have a lot of children named after them out there in the world.
Bacteria and viruses, bioengineering, weaponized strains, terrorists-this is really scary stuff, but I choose not to be afraid. If I ever come across one of these bio-weapons guys though, I'm going to [...].
Rating:
Summary: A chilling and relevant look at bioweapons
Review: Demon in the Freezer is a chilling but important glimpse into the world of bioweapons. In the third book of his Dark Biology trilogy, Preston examines the histories of and threats presented by Anthrax and Smallpox. He writes in a style similar to that of the Hot Zone, breaking chapters into short vignettes that feature the people who work with these dangerous viruses.
Preston specifically examines the Anthrax attacks following September 11th and the possibility of smallpox being used as a biological weapon. He also traces the history of the eradication of smallpox and examines which countries might possess rogue samples of the virus. His writing remains detached, without falling into the trap of him presenting an apocalyptical world view. Instead Preston allows his interview subjects to voice their concern for him.
Like the Hot Zone, this book reads like a suspense novel and is made even more frightening because it is real. This is a great, entirely readable non-fiction thriller.
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