Virals [Hardcover]

Gold Star Award Winner!

Tory and her father live on an island reserved for the faculty who work at the remote research facility on a nearby island. She and her friends often explore the research island. One day, she convinces them to break into the facility to use their equipment in rejuvenating a dog tag ID they found in the woods.

While they have no problems cleaning the dog tags, they discover a missing wild puppy locked in a cage. Outraged, they immediately break Coop out and hide him in their secret cavern.

Tory and her friends take turns caring for the puppy while also trying to unravel the mystery surrounding the dog tags. They search the library, where they uncover clues to the identity of the man. Unfortunately, their search triggers a reaction. Someone doesn't want that information uncovered, and they'll do almost anything to keep Tory and her friends from learning and sharing the truth.

Coop is sick, sick with a strand of virus that infects Tory and her friends. Suddenly, they're having hot flashes, blacking out, and using bursts of adrenaline to execute inhuman feats. These feats occur in times of extreme danger - being followed, chased, shot at, or while breaking into secure buildings.

VIRALS is Kathy Reichs' first foray into the young adult world, and she knocks it out of the park. After a slow start, the tension, drama, danger, mystery, and the strange virus pulsing through the characters' bodies make this book extraordinarily hard to put down. I'm already waiting for the next book in the series.

Reviewed by: Jennifer Rummel

I can't praise this book enough. I'm only halfway through "VIRALS" but I love it. I hadn't realized, when I purchased it, that it was meant for the much younger set. What a pleasant surprise! Tory Brennan is a true chip of the Brennan family: inquisitive,smart and very resourceful. I almost feel like Ms Reichs is having a tremendous amount of fun again. Good for her!! I have just purchased "SEIZURE" and I hope there will be many more in the series. You must read this book if you are a Bones fan and even if you are not, age doesn't much matter here.

Book 1 of the new series featuring Tory Brennan

This novel is written with young adults in mind, the story is told by Tory Brennan the 14 year old niece of anthropologist Temperance Brennan, the well-known protagonist in Kathy Reichs' adult series "Bones". The story is not complicated and does not bog done with tech talk although some is used to stimulate young minds in the science of forensic. Ms. Reichs has added a touch of science fiction, supernatural elements and humour into her mystery to appeal to a younger segment of readers.

The story starts with Tory moving in with her father on Morris Island, S.C. after her mother's death. She has trouble adapting to her new surroundings in an elite private school but fortunately, it is her love for science that creates a bond with three boys who are science geeks much like herself.

One day, Tory finds an Arm Forces identification tag (dog tag) that is old and almost impossible to read and becomes obsessed with finding its owner. Tori and her three new friends (aka the Pack) break into the university lab to clean the tag. The Pack's curiosity is heightened when the name on the tag reveals a link to a decade old missing person, a suspected murder that someone has been working hard to cover -up for years. Tory and her friends use their smarts and new found ability to uncover the truth......

As a side plot, while in the university lab, the "Pack" also looks for clues to the whereabouts of a missing wolf/dog and stumble upon a restricted part of the lab, where questionable experiments are being conducted. To their surprise they find the dog in a quarantine section and unknowingly to them become infected by a strain of canine parvovirus which slowly invades their bodies and modifies their DNA, changing their lives forever.....

This novel is quite engaging even for adults. It was hard at first to adjust to the choppy narrative, but once into it, the tale proceeded beautifully into a captivating mystery with a different twist. Tory, is a smart cookie, kind of a modern day Nancy Drew, a smart and loveable protagonist. The boys behave like boys and adults are perceived as un-hip and coming from another planet. This novel has a cliff-hanger ending and I can honestly say I even enjoyed it more than some of the tedious "Bones" novels.

I think this novel will appeal to the Young and the Young at heart.