The Andromeda Strain, Week 2

Welcome to Week 2 of the Online Book Club discussion of The Andromeda Strain.

How did you like the beginning of the book? I found it to be really hard to get into. I was drawn to the excitement of the first bit where they found all of the people who had died in the town. But, once there was a lot of science-speak, I found myself feeling really lost. I kind of skimmed over the science information and got back into the story, but it was really hard for me to get started. I think I struggled because I just couldn't understand what was happening. There were too many unanswered questions right at the beginning. 

What did you think of the fact that it was presented as a true account in the beginning? Did that make you feel a little confused? I confess that I did a little research to see if the book was based on true events. It just seemed like it could have been something that could have happened. I know that people were concerned about "moon germs," when the first astronauts came back from space. Check out this article to read about the quarantine the astronauts went through when they first came back from space. 

At the start, when the men went to the town to inspect the area after the satellite crashed down, I was convinced that the man in white they mentioned walking through the town was some sort of alien. I thought maybe an alien lifeform had crashed to Earth and had attacked the townspeople. It just seemed too weird that there was one person walking around a town full of horribly disfigured corpses. But, later, once they go to inspect the area again, we find that the man in white was a regular man who just happened to survive the germ. Were you shocked when they found not only him but also a baby? I thought that was pretty amazing. What do you think allowed those two to survive when everyone else died? Did you think it was weird that many of the people in the town seemed to have died in different ways? It's not like the satellite crashed down and everyone immediately died. Some people killed themselves, some were in the street, some were still in their homes--it was just so weird. And, it was so weird that they didn't bleed when the scientists started to test them. What do you think this germ is actually doing? 

What do you think about the scientists who are going to figure out this germ? They are incredibly brave--I can't imagine having to do all of those tests in a short period of time, knowing that the fate of the world rests on their shoulders. Hall, the scientist at the end, has a really pressure-filled job. He is responsible for cancelling the self-destruct feature in the lab if he thinks it's appropriate. That is a lot of pressure! Do you think it will come to that by the end of the book? 

Do you enjoy all of the charts and graphs throughout the book? I find that I don't really understand the information in the graphs, so they haven't been very helpful to me. Are you getting a lot of information from them? 

What else stood out to you in this section? Do you have any sense of how the book is going to finish? Are you excited to keep reading? 

Before you go, did you know that Michael Crichton has a new book out, 16 years after his death? James Patterson helped complete the manuscript for the new book. Find out more about the writing process in the video below. 

I hope you'll leave a comment to let me know what you thought of the first section! Make sure to read the next ten chapters before checking the blog post next week.