Plague of Memory: A Stardoc Novel

This is the best book of the series, in last book Cherijo's memory is gone, so now she wants to be called Jarn, the only memories she has is as Jarn. In this book she is not mean to Duncan, she comes to love him and is a better wife than Cherijo was, it's about time poor Duncan gets treated right. She does not get tortured, beaten, burned, etc, which is a big plus, that was getting kinda old. Also, she doesn't spend all her time being the genius doctor.

I've read the entire series, was disappointed in Rebel Ice but this book makes up for it. This is my favorite one of the series. Cherijo, now called Jarn does'nt spend all her time and energy being a doctor, she does'nt get tortured again and again through out the book and finally Duncan has a real wife who loves him as much as he loves her and she is not mean and hateful to her husband now. Her new personality is a great improvement.

The StarDoc series is one that I don't want to end. S.L. Viehl has constructed worlds, civilizations, societies, and characters that are so real I could step into them and pick up the threads of a life. While I don't want to put the books down once I've started, sometimes you have to take a breath. Each book you get to know the characters better as their personalities are fleshed out and details revealed. Plague of Memory starts at the end of the surprising Rebel Ice and continues logically to follow how Cherijo deals with what happened to her. Present events reach back to the past, clarifying issues you thought you already understood, and hint at future possibilities. I especially appreciated the development of the relationship between Cherijo and Reever. And somebody had better start paying better attention to their daughter Marel. The action deals with a plague attacking the Hsktskt civilizaton and never stops. Altogether a very satisfying read.

Plague of Memory is the seventh book in the StarDoc series (in order StarDoc, Beyond Varallan, Endurance, Shockball, Eternity Row, and Rebel Ice). The main character in the series is Dr. Cherijo Torin/Jarn, a bio-engineered, alien tampered human. In Rebel Ice, Cherijo had a "little mishap" and lost her memory among other things. Plague of Memory is the first step in her journey to meld her two pasts together. A mysterious plague has started on the Hsktskt homeworld of Vtaga and TssVar (StarDoc, Endurance) has requested Cherijo's assistance. Cherijo, Reever, and a team of Jorenians land on the surface and discover that this is not a "normal" disease. The plague itself does not appear to the deadly, but the dementia accompanying it is. Many of the plague victims are committing suicide or harming others. As a last resort, victims are placed in cryogenic sleep, which is not compatible with reptilian physiology. Complicating matters, some outlaws lead by someone who appears to be a Torin lead raids planet-side, Marel keeps running off with her new playmate CaurVar (TssVar's youngest), Maggie is back in her head, and a nasty character last seen in Endurance makes his triumphant return as the villain. Don't you just love space opera, anything goes. I'm a bit disappointed in the reviews that Plague of Memory and, yes, even Rebel Ice have received. The StarDoc series, in its entirety, is a good, if not great, example of the space opera genre. I can't say for sure, but it seems as if this more space opera series (Anne McCaffrey, Arthur C. Clarke, Frank Herbert, Steven Harper, Karen Traviss, David Weber , Lois McMaster Bujold, Simon R. Green, etc...) is being confused with something more Sci-Fi romance (Linnea Sinclair, C.E. Murphy, S.L. Viehl's Bio Rescue series, Patricia Waddell, Patti O'Shea, etc...). If I was looking for a pure Sci-Fi romance, I'm not sure that I would like this book or Rebel Ice either.

After Rebel Ice, I swore I wasn't going to buy the next StarDoc novel. I hated it so much- I actually felt a little betrayed, as a loyal reader, that Viehl would ruin one of my favorite series of all time. My feelings toward Rebel Ice haven't changed, but . . . I loved Plague of Memory. In fact, I consider this the best one since Shockball. In this latest StarDoc novel, Viehl is thankfully back to writing in the first person. There are no surprises, unlike last time, as to which character we're reading about. Cherijo, however, isn't really present in this book. She was basically reborn on Akkabarr with a new personality named Jarn that seems as opposite from Cherijo as she can possibly get. For the first fifty pages or so, I wasn't so sure if I liked the change in personality. I still had some residual anger and I was positive that Jarn was a terrible idea. Pretty quickly, I changed my mind. In Plague of Memory, Jarn is slowly learning to adjust to a new world with vastly different customs and where she knows no one and everyone knows her. They expect her to act and react in the ways they are used to and hardly listen when she tells them- repeatedly- that Cherijo no longer exists. Meanwhile, the Jorenians receive word that a mysterious plague has stricken a Hskskt planet and that Jarn's help is required. She and her namesake, ChoVa, spent most of the book struggling to find a cure for this plague that utimately causes its victims to be extrememly violent and suicidal. The other part of the book and, for me because I'm such a romantic, the more interesting part was Jarn's and Duncan's romance and their struggle to come to terms with their marriage. We have the opportunity to see their relationship from Duncan's point of view and we learn that their marriage may not have been as great as it seemed. Ultimately, I ended up hoping Jarn would not get Cherijo's memories back because I didn't want her to revert back to treating Duncan like she had before. In Plague of Memory, S.L. Viehl once again manages to surprise us several times, but thankfully they're all enjoyable surprises. As for the ending, I found it to be a much more satisfying conclusion without the obvious sequel cliffhanger like the last. I truly enjoyed this latest addition to the StarDoc series and I definitely recommend it.