Thaw By Rick Jasper

The novel “Thaw” by Rick Jasper is a story about two friends who are separated after a storm leads to a major power outage which causes a research project at the Institute for Cryogenic Experimentation to be ruined. Because of the ruined research project, twenty seven federal inmates’ bodies have been thawed out and are now missing. Dani discovers that her friend, Jake, has disappeared because he has been taken into another world by a infamous cult leader and she must enter this world to get her best friend back.

I found it disgusting that the prisoners in this story were being used in an experiment. I believe this is inhumane because experiments should not be conducted on human lives. Even though the people in this story were prisoners and had done unacceptable things in the past, they don’t deserve to be placed in an experiment involving the alteration of human
A reporter in the story asks the institute agent “wasn’t it Scatter Olson who was locked up for life years ago? Didn’t he influence his followers to commit armed robbery and ritual murder?” I find it scary that another being can somehow manipulate others to believe whatever he says and do whatever he wants. I would hate to think what it would be like to not be in control of my own thoughts and actions. At one point in the book a previous cult member says “Scatters says he’s taking his followers into the sky with him tomorrow” meaning they are all going to die together. The compound, where the cult members are, has an explosion and goes on fire with the cult members inside. This is a similar situation to what happened in Waco, Texas in 1993 where the followers of David Koresh (known as Davidians) died inside the compound when they set their buildings on fire to avoid being arrested by the American government agents. They believed David was the final prophet just like in this story when the cult members thought Scatter Olson was their