I've come down with a cold this last week. I took Thursday off work to try to rest and get better, but I don't think it really helped. I still feel like I've got a pool cue ball lodged at the top of my throat and it's not a very pleasant feeling.

Yesterday, this somewhat painful and uncomfortable sensation in my throat begat the beginnings of a scratchy cough and I knew (actually, my wife knew) once I tried to lay down in bed and go to sleep, that scratchy cough would become a pesky inhibitor to sleep.

Sure enough, when I tried to lay down and go to sleep last night, the itchy throat kicked in and I was overcome with a compelling need to cough.

Knowing I had to do something about this in order to sleep, I threw some clothes on and drove over to the neighborhood Smith's grocery store in search for some sugar free (because I'm diabetic) cough drops. I quickly found a couple flavors and headed in the direction of the self-checkout station. On my way, I passed their selection of books for sale and I decided to see what they had. I was pleasantly surprised to see they had Glenn Beck's book in stock. It's only been in stock one other time before that I can remember looking. After looking through the hardcover books, I decided to do a quick pass through the paperbacks to see if there was anything interesting. That's when I found "The Blue Zone" by Andrew Gross. I had heard Gross talking about his new book "A Dark Tide" on the radio and thought I might like this book.

That was between 1:30 and 2:00 in the morning.

I decided to let the cough drops work their magic for a little while before I attempted to sleep again, so I started reading "The Blue Zone." I ended up reading about 150 pages of the book before climbing back in bed (fell to sleep without any problems at all). Then, I read some more this morning, and then finished it tonight- about 22 hours after purchasing it.

I think it goes without saying that it's an easy read.

The story is also an easy one to get into. Kate Raab is the central character in the story and is a graduate student doing some kind of research in genetic biology in the New York City area. Her father is a respected and well known trader of gold and other jewelry commodities.

The story begins with Kate's father being arrested for being involved in a money laundering scheme that was connected to Colombian drug cartels, a charge he firmly denied any knowledge of.

As the government explains the evidence they have against him, they also explain they can work a deal wherein he and his family get witness protection in exchange for his testimony against other people higher up in this scheme. After much deliberation, he decides to go ahead and take the deal. While it seemed he really didn't know what his clients were actually doing with the gold he was selling to them, he knew enough about the transactions and the people involved for the government to build a strong case.

Kate is 23 years-old, about to get married, and working on groundbreaking research in her field. When offered the opportunity to flee into the witness protection program, she declines despite knowing it will be very difficult for her to maintain communication with her family once they go into the program.

Several months later, government authorities go to Kate with news that her father has disappeared and they believe he may be involved in a murder and that her life may be in danger. From here, it seems Kate's whole world gets turned upside down as she tries to figure out why her father was charged in the first place, why he's gone into "the blue zone" (a phrase used for someone in witness protection who has gone missing), and who these people are that he was allegedly involved with and testifying against.

Gross's writing style seems very contemporary and somewhat formulaic. While he does a good job of building suspense and mystery, I can't say he did it completely convincingly. There were a couple times, albeit rare, when I saw something coming that was intended to draw a big gasp of shock from the reader.

In the story, Kate is an insulin-dependent diabetic and was diagnosed just a few years prior to the events in the book. That's interesting to me because I am also a type-1 diabetic and have only been for seven years or so. Gross's handling of the diabetes was a little weak. I think he could have done his research better on the symptoms of high blood sugar and low blood sugar because I didn't buy everything he said about Kate's condition throughout the story.

Twice in the story, a character receives a surprise call on their cell phone. In each case, the character is shocked to hear the voice on the other end of the call because they assumed the call was from someone else. This bothered me because it's a cell phone! Come on! Every cell phone has Caller ID and if it wasn't whoever they thought it was, they would at least see that the number was different or that the Caller ID information was being blocked. I mean, who answers their cell phone blindly anymore and says, "Hey, honey"?!

That being said, this guy is a good storyteller. I'll probably get his next book when it goes to paperback because the premise is interesting.

If you like suspenseful thrillers where the protagonist is thrown into a situation they don't understand and they have to work against all odds to find their way out, you'll probably enjoy The Blue Zone.