The world beneath the world is waiting...
James Rollins has written many adventure thrillers (his hobbies are scuba diving and cave climbing), and also has a series called Sigma Force (covert-ops), fantasy novels (the Godslayer series about a journey to defeat the dark lord) and religious thrillers (uncovering secret societies probably leading to the black heart of the Vatican). So he is either a gifted writer, or he's just pumping them out. I started with his first novel, Subterreanean, and found it well written, mysterious, intriguing, exciting, predictable, overblown, and a little too long.
Ashley Carter is a world class anthropologist from New Mexico, and a single mom. When the US government hires her for a top secret job in Antartica she, of course, brings son Jason along. Her team - including Ben (Australian rock climber), Leslie (Canadian biologist), and Khalid (Arab geologist) are flown to the base of Mount Erebus where a giant cavern has been found three miles down. They are to map the caverns and tunnels as the mineral rights to the area are up for grabs, not knowing a previous team was never heard from again. What they find are mysteries older than time - living creatures that have only been known as fossils, giant diamond geode caves, prehistoric monsters - they even find a fabled civilization! Not all of them, including the military escort, will make it out alive - especially with one of the team actually a terrorist in disguise!
I was excited when they crawled down through the tight rock tunnels, and the mystery grew until about the 300 page mark, when it took a shift and turned into a whole other novel - the discovery of, and political infighting of, a mythical race. I don't want to spill the beans, but by the time all the threads came together there were terrorist bombs going off, monsters amok, political coups, a few murders and a last minute escape all thrown together. It was a bit much, but I guess I got my moneys worth! The writing was good, characters well drawn, and the action never waned. Just what you want in an adventure novel - yet it was tiring, and with about 100 pages left, I just wished it was over. What they found wasn't what I was interested in or expected.
It was written in 1999 - shall I overlook the racist comments? And often there is a black character and you know he'll be the first to get killed off - not this time! We've advanced past that. It's the gay guy. No, there isn't a gay character in the book, he just reveals he's gay as he gets eaten by a monster - so, points for including diverse characters? or completely unneccessary to include that out of the blue?
For what it was, it was interesting - had its exciting moments, certainly creative, a little overblown. This wasn't my favourite but I'll give him another go.
1999 / Paperback / 543 pages
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