20% Rule: The Fifth Vial by Michael Palmer

Pages: 367
Genre: Thriller
Series/Standalone: Standalone
Version: Hardback
Publication Date: February 2007
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Source: Private Collection

Synopsis (GoodReads):

In Boston, a disgraced medical student is sent to deliver a research paper that could save her career. . . . Four thousand miles away, in a jungle hospital in Cameroon, a brilliant, reclusive scientist, dying from an incurable disease that threatens to make each tortured breath his last, is on the verge of perfecting a serum that could save millions of lives, and bring others inestimable wealth. . . . In Chicago, a disillusioned private detective, on the way to his third career, is hired to determine the identify of a John Doe, killed on a Florida highway, with mysterious marks on his body.

Three seemingly disconnected lives, surging unrelentingly toward one another. Three lives becoming irrevocably intertwined. Three lives in mounting peril, moving ever closer to the ultimate confrontation against a deadly secret society with godlike aspirations and roots in antiquity.

Medical student. Scientist. Private eye. Three people who will learn the deeper meanings of brilliance and madness, truth and deception, trust and betrayal.

Three lives linked forever by a single vial of blood--the fifth vial.

Why I Quit:

I didn't even make it to 20% of The Fifth Vial before I decided to throw in the towel.  For a thriller it starts out incredibly slow.  Maybe, I have been spoiled by the few thrillers that I have read because they all just jumped right into the action.

Palmer spends the first 50 pages (probably more but I didn't wait to find out) developing the characters and I did not care for the ones that I had met.  They had interesting backstories and I thought that he did a nice job of create a history for them.

Overall, the writing was just not engaging enough of me to continue.  It was too easy for me to put this one down and forget about it.

Page Completed: 52