The Hot Zone Essay

The Hot Zone Summary
In this thrilling novel, The Hot Zone by Richard Preston tells the story of a virus so notorious for its
mysterious attacks that it is deemed a Bio–safety Level 4 virus. Richard Preston acquired his
inspiration and insight first from his curiosity in his visit to Africa to study epidemiology and
second from certain contacts, Dr. C.J. Peters and Nancy Jaax, whom have helped to further Preston's
knowledge of Bio–safety Level 4 agents. Preston incorporates historical facts, interview encounters,
and scientific evidence in this nonfiction story of a virus known as Ebola infecting many people and
displaying grotesque symptoms such as vomiting blood and pale blue skin. I recommend this book
to young readers, epidemiologists, and those interested...show more content...
This book displays the historical encounters and effects of the Ebola virus have had on past lives
and how the virus functions to destroy its host.
This immense novel displays historical facts, unlike those of a history text book, but as if in a story.
Preston is a very talented writer who understands the fundamentals of creative writing and displays
the historical facts clearly and effectively. The novel immediately starts off with the spark of the
Ebola virus erupting near Mount Elgon in Africa near the Zaire River. Preston tells the story of a
man and his girlfriend who decide to take a vacation hike to the cave of Mount Elgon. The man's
name is Charles Monet and he is a worker in the water pump factory as an engineer and is
described as a recluse who usually stays in his home along the river side. The few people who
know him describe his fondness for wildlife and how he shares a "connection" with the animals.
Once in a while Monet comes down to the village of Eldoret where he meets a woman to take on
his journey to Mount Elgon. However, both of them are completely unaware of what they are going
to uncover in the caves of Mount Elgon. While in the cave at Mount Elgon, Monet and his
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The Hot Zone: A Short Story
The lieutenant, despite his rough nature, had given him a fair warning about the steps that led
down to the tunnels and the vault below. As a man with awkwardly large feet it was no swift
descent. The steps, once he'd lowered the flame to them, were in the most appalling of conditions.
He hadn't enquired into the nature of General Pestardo's visit, such information would be
restricted from the common folk as attacks on his life were surely common, but he couldn't help
but query why such a prolific figure would wish to visit the tunnels of the old Banco de Felipe II.
Given its condition it was hardly likely that anything of any value could be recovered. Then again,
he reminded himself, Pestardo would be arriving in person and under the cover of darkness. A secret
meeting – excluding his humble self – must surely be the reasons for his visit. Regardless he
maintained full focus on the matter at hand. The steps were coming to an end and the smooth stone
was beginning. He looked for the first of the lanterns that were to be ignited. Raising the device
...show more content...
Another tunnel leading off into a new direction would have came as no good news. Thankfully it
wasn't. Eyeing the gate, he knew it not to be a passage of any kind but that of a former place of
security. The vault, or at least what little remained of it. Its cramped insides empty. Not even a rat
would dare cross the threshold, he thought glumly, thinking of the threats that had been made
before. The place where the bodies of the bank employees and wealthy clients were brought. The
killers would have likely preferred to have dumped them inside the vault itself, but the door had
been locked and the key – from what little of the local gossip he'd heard, as that was more
trustworthy than the newspaper articles – could not be found on any member of staff. Instead the
attackers piled up their bodies before the gate, at the very cramped spot he now

Hot Zone Book Review
In the book hot zone it talks about true events surrounding an outbreak of the Ebola virus at a
monkey facility in Reston, Virginia in the late 1980s. Preston provides information about other
viruses spread out through africa around the 1970s and 80s.Preston does not overstate the danger of
Ebola and other filoviruses, he argues that the greater threat lies in emerging viruses like the AIDS
virus, whose effect on the human race cannot yet be measured. The book starts in Kenya in 1980,
where Preston explains the death of French expatriate Charles Monet due to the Marburg virus.
Preston portrays Monet's symptoms and death in great detail(tmi in my opinion), providing the
reader with an immediate sense of the virus as a predator with the potential

Summary The Hot Zone by Richard Preston can be summed up in just a few words; intriguing and
captivating, yet extremely alarming and fairly terrifying. This story chronicles the various different
cases of the Ebola virus throughout the world and its excursion from the rainforests of central
Africa to our very own Washington D.C. The virus's proliferation not only caused extreme terror,
but it led to the recruitment of a SWAT team consisting of military personnel, researchers, and
scientists set out to control the epidemic. Starting with one of the four filoviruses mentioned in the
book, Preston provided us with the story of Charles Monet, an amateur French naturalist who died a
gruesome death after contracting Marburg virus following a trip to Mount Elgon. Marburg is
brought up in the story several times as a close relative of Ebola, having similar symptoms and equal
danger. Throughout the next several chapters, different strains of Ebola are reviewed; the Sudan
...show more content...
It catered to a myriad of different types of readers. A casual reader could dive in to this book for
leisure reasons, and an avid reader, and possibly even an Ebola virus researcher, could refer to this
story as a fact–finding tool and learning resource. It was easy to understand and retain information.
Biological terminology and scientific jargon was explained in a very comprehensible way, making
it easier to those who are not familiar with biology, anatomy or any other type of science to
understand what was going on in the story. One thing I found somewhat confusing in this book was
the organization. It was not set up chronologically, so I found it a little confusing when things
jumped around a bit among decades, locations, and people. The cliffhanger ending was another thing
of which I was not a fan whatsoever; it was an unexciting conclusion to an attention–grabbing story.
It left me with a "that's it?"

The Hot Zone was a very interesting book about the outbreak of the Ebola virus in a monkey
facility in Reston, Virginia in the late 1980s. The true events posed a danger to the public if the
virus got out. I was able to learn about other viral outbreaks. The outbreaks were mainly in Africa in
the 1970s and the 1980s. Preston seemed to argue the threats lie in the emerging viruses like the
AIDS virus. Preston didn't overkill the effects of Ebola or any other virus.
The way the book starts out is in Kenya, talking about the death of Charles Monet. Charles Monet
was a French expatriate and he died from the Marburg virus. The details that was used were so
vivid. I honestly felt as if I was there watching Charles die by this virus. After learning...show more
content...
These individuals spent their lives researching cures or vaccines that would protect civilization. It
was very admirable that they did this even with them knowing the dangers of the virus. I learned
that a hot agent is a deadly virus which has no vaccine or cure.
Preston talks about a scientist named Nancy Jaax who is army veterinarian with two children.
She specializes in hot agents in Maryland. She was doing an experiment in 1983 on Ebola and
was almost exposed in the middle of it when her space suit ripped open. Several years later she
was asked to examine some tissue samples of monkeys who were dying. Jaax confirmed that it was
a new strain of Ebola that was killing the monkeys. The United States Army and the Centers for
Disease Control set up a secret operation to control the virus from spreading to the human population.
The Reston facility is marked as a hot zone but a SWAT team is placed with entering the building
and killing hundreds of monkeys and collecting blood and tissue samples for further study. This
was really upsetting to me. I understand why it was done so we as humans could find a vaccine
and learn more about a deadlier strain of the virus. I also felt bad because we killed innocent
animals in the

The Hot Zone Analysis
One of the novel's greatest faults and strengths lies not specifically in its content, but in how the
content is laid out for the reader. He starts off the novel with what is likely his own imaginings of
the details surrounding the death of Charles Monet, our Marburg patient zero. Given the
circumstances of Monet's death, there was no way that he could have given, in such great detail
as Preston provides, a recounting of the events that took place in days prior to his arrival at
Nairobi Hospital. With that obvious fact in mind, these first few chapters must be taken with a
grain of salt. They are wonderfully descriptive, Preston leaves nothing to the imagination, and are
probably some of the best chapters in the whole book for that reason. Yet descriptive as they may
be, they obviously serve another purpose: to incite fear in the reader....show more content...
I could not have turned the pages fast enough as it was the perfect combination of gore and science.
When the story progressed to Nurse Mayinga's tragic end, I was once again filled with excitement at
yet another descriptive and horrifying death. These were the emotions coursing through me as an
18–year–old with largely no background in science. That one virus could so thoroughly destroy a
human body was humbling and

The Hot Zone Essay
The title of the books that I read for my project were The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story by
Richard Preston and The Princess Bride by William Goldman. What could the similarities and
differences in a non–fiction book and a fictional book? How were the authors' point of views
similar? Which point of view was the best? Which point of view was most believable? These are the
questions that I hope to answer with the information contained in this paper. The Hot Zone: A
Terrifying True Story, tells about the origins of the Ebola virus. The story is told through multiple
peoples' point of view and spins an interesting story that captures your attention. It tells of the action
brought about during the beginning stages of identifying the virus...show more content...
The two books that I read were mostly similar, though. The fact that one story actually happened and
the other didn't made no difference in the point of view in each book. One difference that struck me
though was the fact that The Princess Bride first–person quite frequently to make notes in the book
from Goldman, who abridged the book. There are many similarities in the points of view in these
books. The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story, third
–person is used throughout almost all of the
book, until the end where Preston is telling about his journey to the cave the virus is believed to have
been contained. In that instance, first–person is used. In The Princess Bride, Goldman uses
third–person to tell the story, but also uses first–person to add notes into the story. They are similar in
the way they use two different points of view in the book. The point of that was best, in my
opinion, was The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story. Preston made a point to use the same point of
view through most of the book to present a interesting recap of the horrible story of the Ebola virus.
To me, The Princess Bride, could have done without the little notes from Goldman, the author. It
made the story hard to read when he would attempt to tell the story behind why things were clipped
to make the abridged

Essay on The Hot Zone
AUTHOR: Richard Preston PUBLISHER: Random
House DATE OF PUBLICATION: 1994 Setting: The setting g takes place in two major places.
Reston Maryland which is a suburb of Washington DC. and the second major area is in Kenya
Africa. The story takes place in the 1980's.
Main Characters: Since this story is a true story there is no one character that is a main character.
The author does not create the story around any one main character so I'll just list every character I
can remember from the book. 1. Charles
Monet: He was the first host to the deadly ebola virus breakout in Africa. He was 56 years old and
was kind of a loner according to the authors interviews with people. 2. Dr.
Mosoke: He was Charles Monets doctor when Charles crashed and...show more content...
That is the first symptom of this deadly disease. A few days later he went to the doctors and they
told him he should go to a bigger hospital in Nairobi. Charles caught a flight to Nairobi an the
ninth day after his visit to kitcum cave. All through the flight to Nairobi he was throwing up blood
mixed with a black liquid. When he got to the hospital he sat down and waited to be served. Then
his spine went limp and nerveless and he lost all sense of balance. he started going into shock.
He then started throwing up an incredible amount of blood from his stomach and spilt it on to the
floor. The people who were there said the only sound was the choking in his throat from his
constant vomiting while he is unconscious. Then came the sound of bed sheets being torn in half
which is the sound of his bowels opening up and venting blood from the anus. The blood is
mixed with intestinal lining. His gut is sloughed. The linings of his intestines come off and were
being expelled from his body along with huge amounts of blood. This dying process which
happens to nine out of ten people who come in contact with the deadly disease is called crashing
and bleeding. Samples of his blood were flown to all the major disease labs in the world. The disease
was a Marburg Strain. In Sudan the same types of deaths were wiping out whole tribes. So Gene
Johnson flew over there and worked with sick members of the tribes to try and find a cure. This
strain of

Essay about The Hot Zone
In 1980 a man named Charles Monet went on a trip with a girlfriend up to Mountain Elgon in
West Kenya. They spent the night there and went to a large cave called Kitcum cave. Three days
after his return home, Charles began to have a headache. A few days later he went to the doctors
and they told him he should go to a bigger/better hospital in Nairobi. So Charles flew to Nairobi.
During the flight to Nairobi Charles found himself vomiting blood with a black liquid. Charles
finally reached the hospital only to wait. While he was waiting and he lost all sense of balance.
Charles started to go into shock. He started to throw up even more blood. The people who were
there said the only sound was the choking in his throat from his constant...show more content...
The Military and the C.D.C. (Center for Disease Control) sealed off the building. Nancy Jaax, a
veterinary pathologist at a military fort in Maryland and Jerry Jaax, a veterinarian and husband of
Nancy, led squads of people inside the building wearing specially made suits. Two people working
inside the building were cut and their space suits were torn leaving them exposed to the virus. They
found out that the virus they were working with was a close relative to Ebola Zaire. Ebola Zaire is
the most lethal of all strains of Ebola. It is so lethal that nine out of ten of it's victims die. They
killed all the monkeys in the building and locked their corpses up. This is because if the virus got
out it would kill the entire human population. It would be like another Black Plague, but the Black
Plague only killed 50% percent of those infected while this killed 90% percent. They put a special
chemical inside the building to kill the virus. The chemicals were left in the building for a few days
to ensure their effectiveness.
After a few days the building was examined and it was found the chemical had in fact killed the
virus. The four people that had been exposed to the virus surprisingly all lived. Later it was realized
that the virus must have mutated so it would not cause harm humans. This new virus was called
Ebola Reston. But if the virus was to mutate again, the

The Hot Zone Analysis
My favorite non–fiction piece is The Hot Zone by Richard Preston, which tells the (mostly) true
story of how a case of hemorrhagic fever spread as well as the extensive process involved in
finding and implementing cures. Growing up with two parents involved in medicine left me
assuming that I knew the expanse of every field. The areas of pathology and epidemiology,
however were completely new to me. The realization that the monstrous disease was based on
something real was a wake up call of sorts that inspired me to delve into epidemiology and public
health. I had never truly felt passionate or even remotely confident about my plans for the future, but
this new knowledge gave me a foundation to build on. Of course the book was entertaining

The Hot Zone Essay

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The Hot Zone Essay