Both books are well worth reading for their subject matter. Both are probably some of the most horrifying nonfiction you are likely to read. Horrifying, yes, panicked, no. Rhodes spins a thrilling story without wild speculation. What is valuable in reading this book is the understanding of the mechanisms behind this newly discovered type of infectious agents.
Information is the enemy of panic.
The Fore ritualistically ate the brains of their honored dead, and somehow Kuru affects only those who participate in these rituals. Yet scientists sent to investigate find no genetic, viral or bacteriological cause. These proteins contain no nucleic acid - no DNA, yet they seem to be able to reproduce. The fact that a protein alone could cause such a deadly and debilitating disease was medical heresy at the time. Rhodes describes the interpersonal arguments, and painstaking research required to confirm the existence of prions, and to implicate them in these diseases.