My Throwback Thursday choice this week is the first of a fantastic seven part series that was first released in 2011. Narrated by MacLeod Andrews, who always gives a great performance and brings characters to life with individuality.

My Thoughts

Captain Daniel Ash is woken by his daughter’s cry. As he stumbles into her bedroom he is catapulted into the beginning of the worst nightmare imaginable. His life is going to be turned upside down and inside out. But at that moment Ash can’t comprehend what has happened and is happening to his wife and daughter. Only his son seems ok for now,  just confused. And no wonder.

There’s something terrible going on and after over a week incarcerated in a cell, not knowing why and believing his children are dead, Ash is rescued in the nick of time and taken by stages to a safe place. What happened wasn’t an accident and there’s worse, much worse, to come. Ash has a hard time believing the devastating truth.

He was torn. He wanted to stay with Josie, but the pills Ellen had taken must have really knocked her out, so that meant it was up to him to get help. 

“Hang on, baby,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

He raced into the hall and back to the master bedroom. The nearest phone was on Ellen’s nightstand, next to their bed.

“Ellen. Wake up.”

He shook her once, then picked up the phone and dialed 911. As he waited for it to ring, he glanced back at the bed. Ellen hadn’t moved.

Sick starts out with a terrific, although moving and tragic, scene which pulled me in immediately and didn’t let go from then on. It’s intense, scary, heartbreaking, action packed and exciting.

The fundamental threat that is the basis of the story is mind-boggling, especially when it’s introduced by a dark and shady organisation run by calculating activists. The confusion, rage and determination Ash feels fairly jumps off the page, or in my case out of my ear buds.

There’s so much going on (in a good way) including the sad descriptions of the people succumbing to the virus, the cold deliberation of the ‘soldiers’ in helicopters firing on civilians. The news anchor whose brother falls foul of the killers and a nail-biting, daring rescue. These villains are the worst possible with no regard for human life and so no remorse for their actions. This story sets up the series brilliantly.

About the Book

Daniel Ash wakes after midnight to the cry of his daughter. Just a bad dream, he thinks. She’s had them before. Yet he can’t help but worry when she cries out again as he pads down the hallway. Stepping through her doorway, he expects to find her sitting up in bed, frightened by a nightmare.

But the nightmare is his. It’s real. And it’s just beginning…Something is burning Ash’s daughter alive. Something horrible that is spreading beyond the walls of their home, and taking no prisoners.

Thirty seconds later, Ash will discover his daughter isn’t the only one in his family infected, and as his world spins, coming apart at the seams, a team of armed men in biohazard suits bursts into his house.

But these aren’t the good guys. They haven’t come to save Ash’s family. They’ve come to separate them, to finish what they started.

The problem is Ash refuses to disappear. He wants only one thing: to find those responsible. Because humanity is on the brink of extinction. And man is pulling the trigger.