Jonathan Maberry - Patient Zero

“A first-rate thriller with a bioterror angle that is as horrific as it is plausible… Joe Ledger rules.”

“Jonathan Maberry deserves to take his place among the best suspense writers of recent years.”

“His writing is powerful enough to sing with poetry while simultaneously scaring the hell out of you.”

“It is almost impossible to find a noir-thriller; the two genres are so distinct and separate. Until now. Jonathan Maberry has succeeded in merging the two to such a wondrous extent that we may have to coin neonoir-thriller just to describe it. This book stole a whole evening and most of a night from me, and I was glad of the theft! Patient Zero introduces a cop who is as compelling as any character I’ve read in years. If you took the pace of Grisham, the eerie atmospheric style of Peter Straub or Tom Piccirilli, the Wambaugh-type cop who has become a rarity, and the thriller skill of Lee Child, you’d have the best of all worlds. You’d in fact have Jonathan Maberry’s new novel. This is the new voice of the thriller!”

“This is the coolest book I’ve read since discovering Covert-One. With this new series, Jonathan Maberry becomes my generation’s Robert Ludlum. Joe Ledger is a hero for the new millennium—tough as nails, sharp as a whip, and up for anything. He’s a man who puts honor before his own self-preservation, who rides the edges and isn’t afraid to go down fighting. The story is absolutely riveting and the scariest concept to come down the pike in a long while. I want Ledger to fight all my battles. I dare you to put this book down before the endgame plays out. I dare you.”

“Fair warning: when you start this book, be sure you have budgeted the time to finish it. It’s very hard to put this one down. Patient Zero weaves science, police procedure, and modern anti-terror techniques into a unique blend and tops it off with a larger-than-life character who is utterly believable. I couldn’t put it down.”

“ Patient Zero is a feast for thriller lovers! It’s a delicious and diabolical stew of genres and traditions. With a pinch of forensic procedural, a dash of hard-boiled noir, a sprinkle of medical thriller, and a tincture of apocalyptic zombie epic, Jonathan Maberry cooks up a succulent meal of mayhem that slyly comments on our paranoid times. The hardshelled hero, Baltimore shamus Joe Ledger, deserves to stand alongside F. Paul Wilson’s Repairman Jack in the pantheon of genre icons. Highest recommendation!”

“ Patient Zero is an action-packed novel, filled with unforgettable characters and rapid-fire, spot-on dialogue that makes you eager for more. Within this story, Maberry brings new meaning to the word zombie, ripping it from the pages of folkloric fantasy and shoving it into the realm of horrific plausibility. I defy anyone to put this novel down after the first two pages: it simply can’t be done!”

“Jonathan Maberry has created a new genre. Mixing technology, thrills, chills, and procedural noir, Maberry shows why he is one of the freshest voices in fiction. Every reader will want to ride shotgun on Joe Ledger’s adventures.”

“Smart, scary, and relentless! Maberry’s Patient Zero keeps coming at you with action, suspense, and the kind of detail that makes you believe, ‘Yeah, this could really happen.’”

“This book KICKS ASS! I read the whole thing with a big crazy grin of pure delight on my face, and I haven’t stopped smiling yet. Zombies! Terrorists! Mad scientists! Heavy weapons! Stuff blowing up! And in the middle of it all, Joe Ledger, one truly badass action hero for the new millennium. You want to know what this book is? It’s pure distilled essence of fun. Take a big ol’ swallow of it and hang on tight, ’cause you ain’t sleeping ’til it’s done with you. But you are gonna love the trip.”

“A riveting page-turner. Cool stuff! Hooray for Jonathan Maberry. Please give us more Joe Ledger right now!”

“If Stephen King were to get hold of [Vince Flynn’s] Mitch Rapp, you’d have an idea of what Jonathan Maberry has accomplished with the Department of Military Science’s uberagent Joe Ledger. Patient Zero is a frightening tale that injects a new level of horror into the already terror-filled post-9/11 world. A bioterror weapon that raises the dead? In Maberry’s masterful hands, you will believe!”

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This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

PATIENT ZERO. Copyright © 2009 by Jonathan Maberry. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.stmartins.com

Book design by Jonathan Bennett

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Maberry, Jonathan.

Patient zero : a Joe Ledger novel / Jonathan Maberry—1st ed.

p. cm.

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-38285-8

ISBN-10: 0-312-38285-5

1. Detectives—Maryland—Baltimore—Fiction. 2. Terrorism—Prevention—Fiction. 3. Bioterrorism—Fiction. 4. Zombies—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3613.A19P38 2009

813’.6—dc22

2008038234

First Edition: March 2009

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