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stephen_arvidson's review
4.0
"Agent Mulder, I'm saying this as a friend. Watch your back. This is just the beginning" - Assistant Director Skinner (p.117).
Quarantine is a young-adult novelization of the Season Two episode of The X-Files titled "F. Emasculata". When a deadly contagion is unleashed in a Virginia penitentiary, FBI Agents Mulder and Scully are summoned to investigate by orders from above. At the prison, Scully attempts to discover the cause of the mysterious disease after several inmates die within 36-hours of infection. Meanwhile, Mulder assists a team of U.S. Marshals in a manhunt for two escaped prisoners.
With it laudable pacing and undiluted character dialogue, Quarantine is certainly one of the better X-Files novelizations. More notably, this book is the only adaptation to feature Cancer Man (the juvenile series generally avoided the myth-arc episodes). Young readers will relish the high-octane suspense as law enforcement officials race to capture the escapees, and the shadowy intrigue of a government conspiracy to hide the disease from the public. However, readers who are easily nauseated may want to take a pass on this one, for there are a few mildly graphic scenes featuring pus-erupting boils and reddish-orange insects dwelling inside them. Personally, I'm more troubled by Scully's clumsy fieldwork in this case—which directly results in the death of the doctor who wanted nothing more that to help her uncover the truth.
Despite its riveting premise, Quarantine contains sparse writing—and, unfortunately, several hard-to-miss spelling and grammatical errors (boy, did the editor take a mental vacation on this one!). Clocking in at about 128 pages, it's a breeze to read. Speedy readers can likely finish the book in roughly the same time it would take to watch the episode.
Quarantine is a young-adult novelization of the Season Two episode of The X-Files titled "F. Emasculata". When a deadly contagion is unleashed in a Virginia penitentiary, FBI Agents Mulder and Scully are summoned to investigate by orders from above. At the prison, Scully attempts to discover the cause of the mysterious disease after several inmates die within 36-hours of infection. Meanwhile, Mulder assists a team of U.S. Marshals in a manhunt for two escaped prisoners.
With it laudable pacing and undiluted character dialogue, Quarantine is certainly one of the better X-Files novelizations. More notably, this book is the only adaptation to feature Cancer Man (the juvenile series generally avoided the myth-arc episodes). Young readers will relish the high-octane suspense as law enforcement officials race to capture the escapees, and the shadowy intrigue of a government conspiracy to hide the disease from the public. However, readers who are easily nauseated may want to take a pass on this one, for there are a few mildly graphic scenes featuring pus-erupting boils and reddish-orange insects dwelling inside them. Personally, I'm more troubled by Scully's clumsy fieldwork in this case—which directly results in the death of the doctor who wanted nothing more that to help her uncover the truth.
Despite its riveting premise, Quarantine contains sparse writing—and, unfortunately, several hard-to-miss spelling and grammatical errors (boy, did the editor take a mental vacation on this one!). Clocking in at about 128 pages, it's a breeze to read. Speedy readers can likely finish the book in roughly the same time it would take to watch the episode.
wyrmbergmalcolm's review
3.0
Another bare bones novelisation that directly takes the episode F. Emasculata and turns it into readable material. Adds nothing to the experience.
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