The Digital Plague

So many science fiction books seem to descend into aimless action chases and that is the case here. There is no heart or reason for a lot of what happens in this book that makes it an almost meaningless adventure. Just the idea of the plague itself and some of the world building prevents the book from being a complete write off. Jan 26, Michelle Plass rated it it was amazing.

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Avery Cates is the perfect anti-hero. It's a rare author who can pull that off so kudos to Jeff Somers. This book was like a non-stop action movie, which normally I'm not a big fan of in books. However, it worked here! I finished the book in two sittings because I just couldn't put it down. This was the least predictible book I've ever read and I think that's what made reading it so much fun.

I loved the fact that it was Science Fiction, yet I wasn't bogged down with lots of complicated scienfitic explainations. The way the chapters were titled was fascinating to me. It was fun trying to figure out what was going to happen in the book based on them. Without a doubt I'll be checking out the other two books in the series to see if they're as much of a great read as this one was! Jul 09, Veach Glines rated it it was ok. I wish I liked it more than I do. There are some editor-errors which stick in my memory the repetition of information, telling me something in Chapter 1 and again in Chapter The story line seems inventive at first, but once you get pages in, you realize this plot is rolling on re-treaded tires in a rut that has been driven in many times before I don't like a protagonist or main-character based story that's n I wish I liked it more than I do.

I don't like a protagonist or main-character based story that's not a sequel, just another story that continually reminds the reader "hey I did some stuff in another story that you probably should read to understand what I mean when I refer to this other stuff" - amateur. Aug 15, Robert Smith rated it really liked it. Dark, dystopian sic fi with some interesting premises and an anti-hero that stays interesting.

Having not read the first book in the series, this is where I jumped in. There were enough bread crumbs to get me settled on who was who and what they meant without belaboring things. It's dark, but there's enough humor to keep it from being oppressive and to keep it from being great literature, I guess. Be prepared to want to finish the books, though, because the hero solves one problem at the end w Dark, dystopian sic fi with some interesting premises and an anti-hero that stays interesting.

Be prepared to want to finish the books, though, because the hero solves one problem at the end without basically stopping the slide of the world into entropy… Nov 26, Nicole rated it liked it Shelves: I'm not sure where Avery goes from here. Mar 18, Sissy Van Dyke rated it it was ok.

Jan 05, kingshearte rated it liked it Shelves: This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. It's still not my usual taste, but I can appreciate the way it's written. His gunfight scenes and there are many really are exquisitely written. Normally one thinks of a gunfight as something you need to watch, because you couldn't possibly just explain it all in words and have it be exciting.

Somers actually manages that. He gives you enough description of both the setting and all the play Book 2 in Somers' Avery Cates series, and I enjoyed it about as much as I enjoyed the first one. He gives you enough description of both the setting and all the players' moves as far as Cates is aware of them that you can visualize it very easily and I don't always visualize very well , but not so much that he gets bogged down in details and loses the pacing of it.

It moves fast, it moves well, and he generally makes reading about them just about as good as watching them. Which I do think is an accomplishment. He also, as I mentioned in book 1, manages to make you like the characters even though they're mostly unlikable. I still don't get how he does that. Something I'm less fond of is his repetitiousness. I don't recall noticing it so much in the first book, but looking back, there were a lot of references to the Unification riots, and pretty much every new setting was described as having been burned in said Unification riots and never rebuilt.

There was more of that in this book, with the addition of repeated references to various things arising from the Monk riots. Also, I swear, for the first half of the book, every other chapter mentioned the fact that the System is being run by the Undersecretaries now that the Joint Council has been proven to be a bunch of computers which are now offline. Stop telling us, for the love of whatever. He's written it in such a way that you're clearly expected to have read the first book, but he still feels the need to remind you repeatedly of what happened in it. Eventually, that improved, but it really did bug, especially for the first half of the book.

The plague itself was well executed, with the clues building, until you understand the situation. And then the situation is revealed to be even worse, with everyone turning into techno-zombies. That was pretty freaky and gross.

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Gotta say though, anyone with an impressionable mind at all should probably keep their plague reading to the summer months, because hearing the near-constant nose-blowing and coughing of winter can make one a little nervous when reading about a virulent killer plague. I did call or at least suspect the twist about Hense fairly early on, but it opens up some more interesting possibilities for future books, so we'll see if that goes anywhere.

I was kind of happy about it, too, since I did rather like that character. I was pretty disappointed with Glee's death, though. We didn't really know her too well before she died, but she seemed like there was stuff you could do with her, so it's too bad she had to bite it. I think maybe Somers is nervous about trying to write engaging, human female characters, and that's why he didn't want to keep this one going too long.

Well, that and the fact that her death is fairly crucial to various aspects of the story. Generally, though, it was a fun, pulpy romp through a dystopic universe, that I look forward to returning to in the next installment. Note that those who are offended by swearing will probably want to avoid this series. It will kill other people. At this point everyone, except, apparently, Avery Cates, knows what is in that hypodermic.

We can be reasonably certain that Cates does not know and is not psychically forbidden to know, because this is a first-person narrative. He has only three friends in the world. They die of disease in the first section of the book, because Cates does not tell them that he is infectious and they should stay away from him. This makes his motivation for the rest of the book unbelievable. So even if he had shown the intelligence of a ten-year-old and warned people off, they probably still would have become infected and started spreading the infection around the city and the world.

Also, there are superhero-level psychics in this world. This is a first-person telling, however, so we know he was and remained aware of it. Go away, even for a few hours, and the infected person will die. Expand the broadcast range of the nanobot deactivators, and the nanoviruses stop replicating. Everyone lives until the broadcast is turned off.

This is not a spoiler. Does anyone think of using another transmitter to duplicate the low-power broadcast throughout a building, city, or even the world? And the writing certainly was fast-paced, hard and gritty. Aug 27, Sarah Sammis rated it liked it Shelves: One of the difficulties with checking out books from the library is following series. Either they don't have all of them or the old ones and the new ones are shelved in different places.

Unfortunately they are shelved halfway across the library from each other as one is in One of the difficulties with checking out books from the library is following series. Unfortunately they are shelved halfway across the library from each other as one is in the "new acquisitions" and the other is shelved with the older books. Although The Digital Plague is a fast paced dystopian romp through a futuristic New York City, it manages to stand well enough on its own. There are points of reference to The Electric Church to clue the clueless so that one can follow along as Avery runs, jumps and shoots his way through the book.

Like The Digital Plague I began the Stainless Steel Rat series out of order, although chronologically it comes before the earlier books. I remember being immediately swept into the action and that's what happened here too.

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I didn't care that I wasn't entire sure what was going on or who all the characters were because I was racing alongside Avery. The basic plot is that a plague of nanobots has been let loose in New York. Everyone exposed dies within a fixed timeline. Avery is patient zero except he's not dying. He's now being chased down to contain the disease but he doesn't know who he can trust and who he can't.

He's not even sure he wants to trust those who can help. Nanobots aren't anything new but Avery's New York is enough wrapping to make this version of the story worth the read. I've now checked out the first book in the series, The Electric Church and I will post a review when I'm finished. Then I'll decide if I want to read books three and four. Click on a title to read reviews. Dec 14, Stuart Dean rated it liked it. The 2nd Avery Cates book.

It's the basic "DOA" scenario. Cates gets injected with a virus that will kill him in a certain amount of time and he has to hunt down the guy who did it to him. Also, the virus is contagious and kills everyone he comes in contact with, and will eventually kill everyone on Earth. So Cates hunts down a lead, corners some guy with info, who gives him the name of another guy, and literally as he's walking out the door to follow the new lead he's surrounded and captured. Th The 2nd Avery Cates book.

Then he miraculously escapes. And every time he's captured he receives a brutal beating with permanent physical damage. Avery Cates will never dance in the ballet again. Cates wasn't overly likable in the first book, but in this one everyone he considers a friend is dead which makes him extra brutal and somewhat whiny.

The Digital Plague (Avery Cates, #2) by Jeff Somers

Another long chase book, but the "assassin with morals" bit gets worn pretty thin, since Cates' rule of killing only people who deserve it gets pretty broad. People who deserve to be killed now includes basically anybody who gets in his way, including old friends. Cates is harder to accept in this book, and it has a massive, glaring, huge, giant, and also massive plot hole. If you were captured by your enemies and they injected something into your neck and let you go, don't you think you might take the time to find out just what they'd done to you?

Cates just goes back home and ignores the crusty red sore on his neck. Less time is spent in describing the world around him than in the last book and it's missed. Still, entertaining and fast paced. Starts vicious, end ugly. Jun 29, Kerry rated it liked it. This book is plagued as I'm guessing the series is by bad language.

In a writing class I would call it lazy language. There is a limit to the number of times that the "F" word will have impact. After thay, you might as well be using "very", although very would not get in the way of the story like the "F" word did. I realize that this book is labelled as "noir," but come on. Let's get a little more creative with our language. The main character, Avery Cates, is a rough personality. For him to s This book is plagued as I'm guessing the series is by bad language.

For him to swear when he speaks is not surprising or jarring. I think what bothered me the most is that the same profanity is also used in the narration.

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I realize that it is told first person. However, in many instances I found the word unnecessary. The sentence read as well or better if it was simply left out. And I failed to believe that two of the 'upper class' characters in the novel would use it as commonly as they did. My main suggestion would be to red-pencil about two-thirds of the "F" words in the book. That said, let's look at the story. This is book 2 of a series. Book 3 just came out. Book 2 is always a hard place to start. But this one was okay. Enough backstory was given so that I wasn't lost without becoming burdensome to the current story.

The story begins with action and keeps the pace the entire way through. Avery Cates is everything I am not and vice versa. It was hard to like him through most of the book, but by the end, I actually did find myself caring. Jul 23, Nick Cato rated it it was amazing Recommends it for: Someone injects Cates with a mysterious substance--the same substance that has begun to kill off others like a mix of cancer and ebola. With the help of some new "System Pigs" a. Those who come within eight or so feet of Cates instantly catch the plague, but those who STAY with him remain okay until they leave his presence hence why our small crew stays close together throughout the novel.

Along the way there's run-ins with various freaks, geeks, and even some Monks who survived the Electric Church's downfall. Jul 12, Tez rated it really liked it. Science and technology combine for another intriguing cyber-noir read from Jeff Somers.

On his knees with a gun to his head, Avery Cates thought this would be his execution. Instead, he is injected with nanotech, which is infecting everyone who crosses his path - unless they stay within a certain distance. Who did it, why, and how to stop the deaths are far from easy to answer - and it's even more difficult to cope when the dead don't stay dead.

Avery's battle with them is far from over. And, hopefully, so is this series. It took me a while to realise that this is set more than five years estimate since The Electric Church ended, and it may mean something that the appendix was easier to follow than the actual story.

Still, at least the author has interesting concepts and characters that I haven't really come across before. Reading the first two books in this series on the trot, it's kind of annoying that I now have to wait for The Eternal Prison 's circa-July release. The good news is there's a teaser of it at the back of The Digital Plague , and it sounds a treat. This series may be hard on the brain, but if you pay attention and keep focused, it has its rewards. Aug 11, Daniel rated it it was amazing. I liked this entry in the series even better than the last.

I believe this to be not only a great story, but in many ways some of the greatest cyberpunk books I've read in a long time. I can't think of another genre these books represent, besides the science fiction, obviously. Avery Cates is a bad man, perhaps the most wanted and richest criminal in NYC. He kills without remorse and the System Cops now are not allowed to touch him, though that is not entirely true. He is the vector, the One.

He I liked this entry in the series even better than the last.

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He contains a nanotech virus that destroys the host and automatically infects anyone within ten feet of the afflicted. It is controlled from far away, another continent in fact, and can be reversed to animate the fallen into a viable fighting force. Avery Cates is more dangerous than he has ever been, and finds out that his particular nanites broadcast fiend that limits the other nanites in the afflicted around him, so the victim isn't killed. This makes him even more valuable. In his snark and violent life, one would never see Cates as being a victim in anything,and yet in this book he is just so.

He uses it as best he can, because that is who he is, but the impact of this and his condition indeed shakes him. This was a joy to read and finally finish. I have the next book and I am going to dive into it as soon as possible. Sep 11, Andy rated it really liked it. Avery Cates is a badass in the purest sense and meaning of the word. The future setting and connection to the first novel in the series is pretty flawless, and it is apparent that Somers knew exactly what he was doing and where he was going with the story line. Taking place several years after TEC, Cates finds himself being injected with something at the very beginning of the book.

A few pages later and people are already dying, and it is fairly obvious that it is Cates fault, it's just no one knows why, including Cates himself. From there the story goes in the direction expected. Cates finds himself connected to the people he loathes; cops, and then flying over to Europe to figure it all out. Not wanting to spoil the story I suggest reading TEC immediately, and then diving into this one.

It is not like this book with change your life, but it is good SF and takes the principles of SF and applies them neatly and steadfastly. Somers is definitely a new voice in the cyberpunk world and it fits. Not quite up to the standard of Gibson or Sterling, Somers is definitely climbing his way up tot he top of this particular brand of SF.

Oct 01, Scout rated it really liked it. Sequel to The Electric Church. Probably half a star less good than the first, but only because it feels like Somers had to stretch a bit to connect this one to the last. In the opening chapters it seemed like he'd jettisoned the events of the first book and taken this in a new direction, which was disappointing. But then, just as I was getting accustomed to the fact that we were headed somewhere else, things tied back to the action of the prior book, and I sort of felt gypped. That's not to say Sequel to The Electric Church. That's not to say the book wasn't fast paced and fun to read--it was.

It just felt a bit like the character set up at the end of the first book was kind of dumped as the new one started. Hard to say it clearly without spoiling either book. Main character Avery is clearly the same guy, but the people around him shift in ways that don't feel fair. Ah, but nobody ever said life was fair, I guess. I thought some elements of the first-person narrative didn't work for the first book, but here it's much more of a success.

The tone of the whole plot might be bleak, and the arc of the story coming very grimly down on Cates' shoulders, but the plotting is tight, disarming and clever enough for us most definitely to want to read on. It's almost as if someone has noticed my negative thoughts about the first book and dropped them — the poor repetitions overlapping chapter ends are gone, and while there is a large threat this book ends up just as much of a zombie shoot-em-up like the first, this does not happen.

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Instead we maintain the hellish descents of Cates nay, the very city he calls home through a finely depicted future horror, with fully-fledged humans and their thoughts and worries to the fore. All the time, as well, the action is building at a very nice pace, and the descriptions — which the first-person character might have struggled with — are very good, and serve evidently well for giving us what we want of this future dystopia. The scope is still broad — a post-apocalyptic Paris is featured in a long scene — and the demolition of a whole US seaboard full of people is on a par with the human travails.

This then, is a much more successful book than the first. The manner of the story, the depth to it, and the reach to the whole adventure — for a superior action-adventure read is what it boils down to — is so much better. There is still a sense the beginning chapters could be a bit more audience-friendly, with some details of Cates' world told too much in the style of Cates and therefore not giving us here in what we might wish for, and there is a cyclical nature to the plotting that is a bit too foreseeable.

Also, there is a sense that the book covers so much ground, it would be unfortunate in fact if the series were to go much further. So great is the apocalypse here, and so borderline unlikely the physical damage on Cates by the end, that the future book introduced here with an extract I haven't bothered to read might be a little OTT. And while I would not wish to rein in Jeff Somers for future reads, I would be surprised it the series did not suffer for having a potential fourth volume, forced by the success of this one to go too far. I only hope to be proved wrong.

An appendix at the end, from a minor character in the narrative, shows again that Somers is a quickly maturing writer, who here provides a much superior genre piece — and with bravery and good outcome, a great mixing of genres too — which the Bookbag recommends. There are minor flaws, and perhaps a more generous reviewer would very happily give four and a half stars, but all the same I would strongly suggest the sci-fi reader put this volume, if not the weaker series opener, on a list marked 'well worth investigation'.

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