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Wyman Ford #3
Impact
Wyman Ford is tapped for a secret expedition to Cambodia... to locate the source of strangely beautiful gemstones that do not appear to be of this world.
A brilliant meteor lights up the Maine coast... and two young women borrow a boat and set out for a distant island to find the impact crater.
A scientist at the National Propulsion Facility discovers an inexplicable source of gamma rays in the outer Solar System. He is found decapitated, the data missing.
High resolution NASA images reveal an unnatural feature hidden in the depths of a crater on Mars... and it appears to have been activated.
Sixty hours and counting.
364 pages, Hardcover
First published January 5, 2010
594 people are currently reading
4391 people want to read
About the author
Douglas Preston
183 books13.5k followersDouglas Preston was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1956, and grew up in the deadly boring suburb of Wellesley. Following a distinguished career at a private nursery school--he was almost immediately expelled--he attended public schools and the Cambridge School of Weston. Notable events in his early life included the loss of a fingertip at the age of three to a bicycle; the loss of his two front teeth to his brother Richard's fist; and various broken bones, also incurred in dust-ups with Richard. (Richard went on to write The Hot Zone and The Cobra Event, which tells you all you need to know about what it was like to grow up with him as a brother.)
As they grew up, Doug, Richard, and their little brother David roamed the quiet suburbs of Wellesley, terrorizing the natives with home-made rockets and incendiary devices mail-ordered from the backs of comic books or concocted from chemistry sets. With a friend they once attempted to fly a rocket into Wellesley Square; the rocket malfunctioned and nearly killed a man mowing his lawn. They were local celebrities, often appearing in the "Police Notes" section of The Wellesley Townsman. It is a miracle they survived childhood intact.
After unaccountably being rejected by Stanford University (a pox on it), Preston attended Pomona College in Claremont, California, where he studied mathematics, biology, physics, anthropology, chemistry, geology, and astronomy before settling down to English literature. After graduating, Preston began his career at the American Museum of Natural History in New York as an editor, writer, and eventually manager of publications. (Preston also taught writing at Princeton University and was managing editor of Curator.) His eight-year stint at the Museum resulted in the non-fiction book, Dinosaurs in the Attic, edited by a rising young star at St. Martin's Press, a polymath by the name of Lincoln Child. During this period, Preston gave Child a midnight tour of the museum, and in the darkened Hall of Late Dinosaurs, under a looming T. Rex, Child turned to Preston and said: "This would make the perfect setting for a thriller!" That thriller would, of course, be Relic.
In 1986, Douglas Preston piled everything he owned into the back of a Subaru and moved from New York City to Santa Fe to write full time, following the advice of S. J. Perelman that "the dubious privilege of a freelance writer is he's given the freedom to starve anywhere." After the requisite period of penury, Preston achieved a small success with the publication of Cities of Gold, a non-fiction book about Coronado's search for the legendary Seven Cities of Cibola. To research the book, Preston and a friend retraced on horseback 1,000 miles of Coronado's route across Arizona and New Mexico, packing their supplies and sleeping under the stars--nearly killing themselves in the process. Since then he has published several more non-fiction books on the history of the American Southwest, Talking to the Ground and The Royal Road, as well as a novel entitled Jennie. In the early 1990s Preston and Child teamed up to write suspense novels; Relic was the first, followed by several others, including Riptide and Thunderhead. Relic was released as a motion picture by Paramount in 1997. Other films are under development at Hollywood studios. Preston and Child live 500 miles apart and write their books together via telephone, fax, and the Internet.
Preston and his brother Richard are currently producing a television miniseries for ABC and Mandalay Entertainment, to be aired in the spring of 2000, if all goes well, which in Hollywood is rarely the case.
Preston continues a magazine writing career by contributing regularly to The New Yorker magazine. He has also written for National Geographic, Natural History, Smithsonisan, Harper's,and Travel & Leisure,among others.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/dougla...
As they grew up, Doug, Richard, and their little brother David roamed the quiet suburbs of Wellesley, terrorizing the natives with home-made rockets and incendiary devices mail-ordered from the backs of comic books or concocted from chemistry sets. With a friend they once attempted to fly a rocket into Wellesley Square; the rocket malfunctioned and nearly killed a man mowing his lawn. They were local celebrities, often appearing in the "Police Notes" section of The Wellesley Townsman. It is a miracle they survived childhood intact.
After unaccountably being rejected by Stanford University (a pox on it), Preston attended Pomona College in Claremont, California, where he studied mathematics, biology, physics, anthropology, chemistry, geology, and astronomy before settling down to English literature. After graduating, Preston began his career at the American Museum of Natural History in New York as an editor, writer, and eventually manager of publications. (Preston also taught writing at Princeton University and was managing editor of Curator.) His eight-year stint at the Museum resulted in the non-fiction book, Dinosaurs in the Attic, edited by a rising young star at St. Martin's Press, a polymath by the name of Lincoln Child. During this period, Preston gave Child a midnight tour of the museum, and in the darkened Hall of Late Dinosaurs, under a looming T. Rex, Child turned to Preston and said: "This would make the perfect setting for a thriller!" That thriller would, of course, be Relic.
In 1986, Douglas Preston piled everything he owned into the back of a Subaru and moved from New York City to Santa Fe to write full time, following the advice of S. J. Perelman that "the dubious privilege of a freelance writer is he's given the freedom to starve anywhere." After the requisite period of penury, Preston achieved a small success with the publication of Cities of Gold, a non-fiction book about Coronado's search for the legendary Seven Cities of Cibola. To research the book, Preston and a friend retraced on horseback 1,000 miles of Coronado's route across Arizona and New Mexico, packing their supplies and sleeping under the stars--nearly killing themselves in the process. Since then he has published several more non-fiction books on the history of the American Southwest, Talking to the Ground and The Royal Road, as well as a novel entitled Jennie. In the early 1990s Preston and Child teamed up to write suspense novels; Relic was the first, followed by several others, including Riptide and Thunderhead. Relic was released as a motion picture by Paramount in 1997. Other films are under development at Hollywood studios. Preston and Child live 500 miles apart and write their books together via telephone, fax, and the Internet.
Preston and his brother Richard are currently producing a television miniseries for ABC and Mandalay Entertainment, to be aired in the spring of 2000, if all goes well, which in Hollywood is rarely the case.
Preston continues a magazine writing career by contributing regularly to The New Yorker magazine. He has also written for National Geographic, Natural History, Smithsonisan, Harper's,and Travel & Leisure,among others.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/dougla...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,066 reviews
December 6, 2017
Score! !
Two young women witness a brilliant meteor that lights up the sky and then falls to earth just off the Maine coast………….
Be warned, for such a small book, this one hosts a big, big story, so you best tinkle, if need be, gather your tea and biscuits, get comfy, strap in. You’re going to be here a while.
This is my first Douglas Preston novel and I gotta tell you, he picked me up and threw me head first into the thick of this story and then, quite simply, pumped up the volume.
A fast paced, action packed, thriller with an X File edge.
I had a great time here!
Two young women witness a brilliant meteor that lights up the sky and then falls to earth just off the Maine coast………….
Be warned, for such a small book, this one hosts a big, big story, so you best tinkle, if need be, gather your tea and biscuits, get comfy, strap in. You’re going to be here a while.
This is my first Douglas Preston novel and I gotta tell you, he picked me up and threw me head first into the thick of this story and then, quite simply, pumped up the volume.
A fast paced, action packed, thriller with an X File edge.
I had a great time here!
October 13, 2020
I love reading the books Preston & Child write together. But, I also enjoy checking out their solo work. Impact is Preston's third entry in the Wyman Ford series. Maybe not loving it as much as the Pendergast series, but still very good.
If you are looking for Indiana Jones type action combined with conspiracy theory and speculative science fiction, then Impact will be right up your alley. It is a wild mashup of all these genres, but works out quite well in the end.
The book starts out with three very unrelated storylines that end up crossing paths through some very farfetched coincidences. You will have to do some serious reality suspending to believe the progress of the plot. But, it is not a serious scholarly journal, it is a bit of escapism, so it's cool!
This book, and the Ford series, are definitely worth checking out if how I have described this book and it's genres intrigues you. I don't think you will regret it!
If you are looking for Indiana Jones type action combined with conspiracy theory and speculative science fiction, then Impact will be right up your alley. It is a wild mashup of all these genres, but works out quite well in the end.
The book starts out with three very unrelated storylines that end up crossing paths through some very farfetched coincidences. You will have to do some serious reality suspending to believe the progress of the plot. But, it is not a serious scholarly journal, it is a bit of escapism, so it's cool!
This book, and the Ford series, are definitely worth checking out if how I have described this book and it's genres intrigues you. I don't think you will regret it!
March 8, 2012
I appreciate the efforts that Douglas Preston put in this book. I know it is hard to write. With the many books already in the market and the new books coming out every month, is there anything else that has not be been written about? I know that the plot’s limit can be as wide as the scope of the imagination of the writer, but there should still be, some sense in the story. Do you agree? Otherwise, if we patronize those books with outlandish, silly and impossible to happen plots those writers will start to believe that some readers are indeed gullible and can be fooled to believe anything.
Case in point is this sci-fi, mystery-thriller book. It’s about a meteorite that hits the earth. It falls somewhere in Maine, USA. So, the characters go there to look at the crater. That is a normal behavior when you see a meteorite falling. Fine. Up to this point, it’s believable. It’s normal. But the book will not sell. So, the editor tells Preston to revise the book. So, he goes on: the meteorite has the size of an orange that you can buy in the supermarket but it creates a crater that has a diameter of 5 feet. And, hold your breath, the crater in Maine is actually an entry point because it has an exit point! And of course it is located in the other side of the world: in Cambodia! And so some of the characters go there too to find what’s in there. At this point, it is no longer believable. The meteorite behaves like a bullet and earth with its non-impregnable core all of the sudden behaving like a human body. It is already unbelievable. It is just not normal. But Preston even went a bit too far: the meteorite comes from Mars because there is a weapon of mass destruction there! WMD of aliens in Mars!!!
This is now my problem with many current science fiction books. Well, their fans can believe anything they want and fool themselves into hoping that those far-fetch scenarios can happen in the future and say “I told you so!”. When they read this review, they say, K.D. is too old to believe on these things and they start to consider un-friending me for not being as cool as them. For example, they believe that fish can be put in the ears of a man so they can speak and understand different languages. Or when they play games about planet wars in their laptops or desktops, the game could actually be a simulation and what they see on the screen is actually happening there in the galaxy far, far away.
But in fairness to Preston and this book, the plot has something new in it. It’s a good combination of sci-fi and mystery-thriller genres. Preston concocted it so well, you will not recognize it right away. It also has some heart in the story by having a father and daughter tandem trying to evade the human beings who are in cahoots with the Mars aliens. The father calling out for his daughter made my heart beat faster while reading the book. For a while, I was able to empathize with the father by imagining me and my daughter in that kind of situation: Kurung! says the flying meteorite striking the truck where the father is riding and trying to find his daughter. Abbbby! Abbbby! ABBBBY! says the panicky tearful father in increasing crescendo.
But so sorry, Mr. Preston. That’s the only part – a split second part – where I thought your book was worth reading. But I am not giving you a one star rating. I checked your profile here at GR and I was impressed. You are into anthropology and you must have some basis in your thought that earth can be invaded by aliens. Why not? Many articles and studies have been done about it so the curiosity must have some basis somewhere.
Maybe I am just too fixated with my daily life that I better look up at the sky one of these nights and see if there are really other creatures lurking out there.
Case in point is this sci-fi, mystery-thriller book. It’s about a meteorite that hits the earth. It falls somewhere in Maine, USA. So, the characters go there to look at the crater. That is a normal behavior when you see a meteorite falling. Fine. Up to this point, it’s believable. It’s normal. But the book will not sell. So, the editor tells Preston to revise the book. So, he goes on: the meteorite has the size of an orange that you can buy in the supermarket but it creates a crater that has a diameter of 5 feet. And, hold your breath, the crater in Maine is actually an entry point because it has an exit point! And of course it is located in the other side of the world: in Cambodia! And so some of the characters go there too to find what’s in there. At this point, it is no longer believable. The meteorite behaves like a bullet and earth with its non-impregnable core all of the sudden behaving like a human body. It is already unbelievable. It is just not normal. But Preston even went a bit too far: the meteorite comes from Mars because there is a weapon of mass destruction there! WMD of aliens in Mars!!!
This is now my problem with many current science fiction books. Well, their fans can believe anything they want and fool themselves into hoping that those far-fetch scenarios can happen in the future and say “I told you so!”. When they read this review, they say, K.D. is too old to believe on these things and they start to consider un-friending me for not being as cool as them. For example, they believe that fish can be put in the ears of a man so they can speak and understand different languages. Or when they play games about planet wars in their laptops or desktops, the game could actually be a simulation and what they see on the screen is actually happening there in the galaxy far, far away.
But in fairness to Preston and this book, the plot has something new in it. It’s a good combination of sci-fi and mystery-thriller genres. Preston concocted it so well, you will not recognize it right away. It also has some heart in the story by having a father and daughter tandem trying to evade the human beings who are in cahoots with the Mars aliens. The father calling out for his daughter made my heart beat faster while reading the book. For a while, I was able to empathize with the father by imagining me and my daughter in that kind of situation: Kurung! says the flying meteorite striking the truck where the father is riding and trying to find his daughter. Abbbby! Abbbby! ABBBBY! says the panicky tearful father in increasing crescendo.
But so sorry, Mr. Preston. That’s the only part – a split second part – where I thought your book was worth reading. But I am not giving you a one star rating. I checked your profile here at GR and I was impressed. You are into anthropology and you must have some basis in your thought that earth can be invaded by aliens. Why not? Many articles and studies have been done about it so the curiosity must have some basis somewhere.
Maybe I am just too fixated with my daily life that I better look up at the sky one of these nights and see if there are really other creatures lurking out there.
October 15, 2025
ET ... call home??
Wyman Ford, a former CIA agent turned freelance investigator, first introduced to Preston's fans in TYRANNOSAUR CANYON and BLASPHEMY, returns to complete a solo undercover mission to locate a secret Cambodian mine hidden deep in the north Vietnamese jungles. The mine is turning out some very unusual gemstones that happen to be highly radioactive. But, as you might expect with any thriller penned by the likes of Douglas Preston, nothing is quite as straightforward as it seems at first glance. It isn't long before Ford finds his path crosses with a young girl who's attempting to locate the impact site of a small asteroid that recently lit up the night skies of Maine as it screamed into the earth's atmosphere.
At this point the credibility meter is pushed way up into the red zone and right off the scale when we discover that the asteroid isn't an asteroid and the Cambodian mine isn't a mine. The asteroid was actually a mini-black hole shot from an alien weapon based on Mars and the Cambodian mine was (are you ready for this?), the exit wound caused when this mini-black hole blasts its way straight through the earth. The Mars group at the National Propulsion Facility, the CIA, the White House and the American military (God Bless 'Em!) are doing their best to cover up the entire event but Wyman Ford is having none of that.
For those of you that might think these are spoilers, I'll simply say that I beg to differ. You can't spoil what any alert sci-fi reader can figure out for themselves inside of a very few pages. The plot is quick moving with lots of suspense, lots of cliff hangers and lots of twists and turns but, ultimately, it's pretty predictable stuff until the very ending. Now that is where the whole strength of this novel lies! Like BLASPHEMY which is actually a philosophical essay on the existence or the nature of god, IMPACT is more by way of an attempt to provoke thought on the world's reaction to extra-terrestrial intelligence and contact. What do we do if we meet them? What do we say when we meet them? Will we ever be capable of actually communicating with an alien extra-terrestrial species? What will THEY be trying to say when they contact us? What will their intentions be?
As a long time Trekkie with an undergraduate degree in mathematics and physics, I'm in Stephen Hawking's camp. I believe they're out there and I do believe that, at some point, contact is an inevitability. So I think some advance thought as to our response is both appropriate and important. As a thriller, IMPACT is great fun albeit mindless and predictable. But it attempts to place important questions into the public's consciousness and I thoroughly enjoyed the process.
Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
Wyman Ford, a former CIA agent turned freelance investigator, first introduced to Preston's fans in TYRANNOSAUR CANYON and BLASPHEMY, returns to complete a solo undercover mission to locate a secret Cambodian mine hidden deep in the north Vietnamese jungles. The mine is turning out some very unusual gemstones that happen to be highly radioactive. But, as you might expect with any thriller penned by the likes of Douglas Preston, nothing is quite as straightforward as it seems at first glance. It isn't long before Ford finds his path crosses with a young girl who's attempting to locate the impact site of a small asteroid that recently lit up the night skies of Maine as it screamed into the earth's atmosphere.
At this point the credibility meter is pushed way up into the red zone and right off the scale when we discover that the asteroid isn't an asteroid and the Cambodian mine isn't a mine. The asteroid was actually a mini-black hole shot from an alien weapon based on Mars and the Cambodian mine was (are you ready for this?), the exit wound caused when this mini-black hole blasts its way straight through the earth. The Mars group at the National Propulsion Facility, the CIA, the White House and the American military (God Bless 'Em!) are doing their best to cover up the entire event but Wyman Ford is having none of that.
For those of you that might think these are spoilers, I'll simply say that I beg to differ. You can't spoil what any alert sci-fi reader can figure out for themselves inside of a very few pages. The plot is quick moving with lots of suspense, lots of cliff hangers and lots of twists and turns but, ultimately, it's pretty predictable stuff until the very ending. Now that is where the whole strength of this novel lies! Like BLASPHEMY which is actually a philosophical essay on the existence or the nature of god, IMPACT is more by way of an attempt to provoke thought on the world's reaction to extra-terrestrial intelligence and contact. What do we do if we meet them? What do we say when we meet them? Will we ever be capable of actually communicating with an alien extra-terrestrial species? What will THEY be trying to say when they contact us? What will their intentions be?
As a long time Trekkie with an undergraduate degree in mathematics and physics, I'm in Stephen Hawking's camp. I believe they're out there and I do believe that, at some point, contact is an inevitability. So I think some advance thought as to our response is both appropriate and important. As a thriller, IMPACT is great fun albeit mindless and predictable. But it attempts to place important questions into the public's consciousness and I thoroughly enjoyed the process.
Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
February 5, 2013
Creative, exciting and well written. Recommended for all. 10 of 10 stars
November 9, 2024
I have been a big fan of the illustrious duo, Mr. Preston here and his co-conspirator, Lincoln Child who have created the Pendergast series. Those stories have their own style and feel.
But the individual novels by both authors have also left their mark with me and I lap up almost everything they publish. The Wyman Ford series is a very interesting one which pushes the limits of science. Wyman as a character is someone who evokes interest. Wyman as a former government operative turned environmentalist, are well-developed and engaging. His moral dilemmas and personal growth add depth to the story, making readers invest in his journey.
I had got this book over a dozen years back but somehow it had escaped my eyes. I picked it up recently and kicked myself for not getting to it faster.
The book blurb gives up enough of the story to join the dotted lines but the story that spreads over two countries, Vietnam and US is a well paced science thriller. The story has everything a scientific abomination, a secret agency, Vietnamese mafia, radioactive stones, a faux treasure hunt, human greed, sleeper agents and of course an alien hand one the immigrant type in the US and an actual ET outside the planet.
The novel opens with a mysterious meteorite striking a remote area of Maine, setting off a chain of events that unravels both a scientific enigma and a gripping conspiracy.
While Wyman explores the govt. agency angle a young girl (feisty and possible solo book material) who is intelligent and interested in the stars and whom Wyman recruits as an assistant.
The story has stumbling blocks and murders, rogue agents and hit men running amok across the country but delivers at its own pace and at the end has tied up all prospective loose ends.
The story starts slow and goes into unnecessary plot lines and side stories that could have been skimmed or avoided, like the way the young girl is pursued because she seems to be after a treasure. This takes the focus of the main story.
Overall I liked the story and enjoyed this adventure.
But the individual novels by both authors have also left their mark with me and I lap up almost everything they publish. The Wyman Ford series is a very interesting one which pushes the limits of science. Wyman as a character is someone who evokes interest. Wyman as a former government operative turned environmentalist, are well-developed and engaging. His moral dilemmas and personal growth add depth to the story, making readers invest in his journey.
I had got this book over a dozen years back but somehow it had escaped my eyes. I picked it up recently and kicked myself for not getting to it faster.
The book blurb gives up enough of the story to join the dotted lines but the story that spreads over two countries, Vietnam and US is a well paced science thriller. The story has everything a scientific abomination, a secret agency, Vietnamese mafia, radioactive stones, a faux treasure hunt, human greed, sleeper agents and of course an alien hand one the immigrant type in the US and an actual ET outside the planet.
The novel opens with a mysterious meteorite striking a remote area of Maine, setting off a chain of events that unravels both a scientific enigma and a gripping conspiracy.
While Wyman explores the govt. agency angle a young girl (feisty and possible solo book material) who is intelligent and interested in the stars and whom Wyman recruits as an assistant.
The story has stumbling blocks and murders, rogue agents and hit men running amok across the country but delivers at its own pace and at the end has tied up all prospective loose ends.
The story starts slow and goes into unnecessary plot lines and side stories that could have been skimmed or avoided, like the way the young girl is pursued because she seems to be after a treasure. This takes the focus of the main story.
Overall I liked the story and enjoyed this adventure.
October 13, 2024
Eyes on the Sky
Abbey Straw and her best friend Jackie are trying out Abbey’s new telescope, when what appears to be a meteor streaks across the night sky and disappears somewhere in the ocean. Abbey has a plan to borrow her father’s lobster boat to go in search of the meteor, certain it must be valuable.
Mark Corso, the youngest technician on the Mars Mission Project receives a classified hard drive in the mail from his mentor who is recently deceased. With the hard drive came a note asking for Mark’s opinion of the gamma ray data collected from the Mars probe. Gamma ray data? There shouldn’t be any gamma rays from Mars? Mark becomes very paranoid about possessing that hard drive, and he should, for more reasons than he knows.
Wyman Ford is once again contracted by the Science Advisor to the President asking Wyman to check find a mine that yields attractive radioactive stones.
So much more is going on than any of these people can imagine, and it all comes together in a way that actually makes sense in this explosive mystery.
I enjoyed this Wyman Ford mystery so much more than the last one. There’s still a lot of science in this Preston’s work, but it was far easier for a lay person to understand in IMPACT. I gave this a 4.5 for keeping the action going with great writing and creativity, rounding up to five.
Abbey Straw and her best friend Jackie are trying out Abbey’s new telescope, when what appears to be a meteor streaks across the night sky and disappears somewhere in the ocean. Abbey has a plan to borrow her father’s lobster boat to go in search of the meteor, certain it must be valuable.
Mark Corso, the youngest technician on the Mars Mission Project receives a classified hard drive in the mail from his mentor who is recently deceased. With the hard drive came a note asking for Mark’s opinion of the gamma ray data collected from the Mars probe. Gamma ray data? There shouldn’t be any gamma rays from Mars? Mark becomes very paranoid about possessing that hard drive, and he should, for more reasons than he knows.
Wyman Ford is once again contracted by the Science Advisor to the President asking Wyman to check find a mine that yields attractive radioactive stones.
So much more is going on than any of these people can imagine, and it all comes together in a way that actually makes sense in this explosive mystery.
I enjoyed this Wyman Ford mystery so much more than the last one. There’s still a lot of science in this Preston’s work, but it was far easier for a lay person to understand in IMPACT. I gave this a 4.5 for keeping the action going with great writing and creativity, rounding up to five.
March 13, 2019
Impact is a genius book with countless storylines all existing at the same time. However, there is a common theme; that something not from this world has struck the planet. Wyman, a man who travels to Cambodia to locate and study jewels that are "otherwordly" soon realizes something is clearly different about these jewels. At the same time this is happening, a young woman named Abbey searches for a meteorite near her town in Maine. These two events/storylines and the mysterious murder of a Mars Mapping researcher are simultaneously brought together as both Abbey and Wyman start to uncover the criminal secrets behind these otherwordly objects. Time is limited and they must solve this mystery before another meteor strikes Earth 'coincidentally.' I genuinely enjoyed this book, and the fact that the author was able to bring these three independent storylines and plots into one big plot shows off his talent as a writer. This is a wonderful book to read and it was one of the select few science fiction books I enjoyed.
July 21, 2019
Excellent book. I see why it’s a best seller. Douglas Preston never lets me down.
January 9, 2012
In the cold light of day, I realize now that this book makes absolutely no sense. I was suspecting a bunch of random people as the Chief Villains, since there is obviously someone siccing the assassin on the heroes; however, I couldn't really figure out who, because I couldn't fathom why someone would be trying to stop the complete annihilation of Earth. I was not very surprised though when the reveal happened even though that too stretched my disbelief to the max.
Today, thinking back further on the book, it makes even less sense. So, a meteor comes streaking to earth. Waitress/genius with a fancy telescope, just happens to be smoking a blunt and taking photographs of the stars and captures a picture of the meteorite. Following day, she gets a boat (and there's other adventure too on the high seas with a meth crazed pirate after her), triangulates the meteor's position based on the photo and fancy math and Oceanic reports, and she finds the crater...but the crater doesn't seem to end!
Meanwhile, ex-CIA operative gets called to DC. There's some crazy mine in Cambodia where these strange gems come from that are being sold as jewelry, but they're so highly radioactive that they're killing people. Plus they can be easily ground down to dirty bomb that will WIPE OUT ALL OF NYC! So hero hustles to Cambodia and with ease destroys the mine and outwits the tons of evil guards posted there.
However, the meteor actually punched a hole through earth. So it hit Maine and went straight through to Cambodia. Waitress found the crater the next day...so how did the people in Cambodia manage to mine and make jewelry and sell it all over the world in a matter of hours? IT MAKES NO SENSE!
Events are so sped up that it makes me tired just thinking about. The waitress and the CIA guy (they meet up and join forces) travel all over the country, land, air, water, fighting off assassin and goverment and trying to stop alien death ray in the time it takes me to do my laundry.
Today, thinking back further on the book, it makes even less sense. So, a meteor comes streaking to earth. Waitress/genius with a fancy telescope, just happens to be smoking a blunt and taking photographs of the stars and captures a picture of the meteorite. Following day, she gets a boat (and there's other adventure too on the high seas with a meth crazed pirate after her), triangulates the meteor's position based on the photo and fancy math and Oceanic reports, and she finds the crater...but the crater doesn't seem to end!
Meanwhile, ex-CIA operative gets called to DC. There's some crazy mine in Cambodia where these strange gems come from that are being sold as jewelry, but they're so highly radioactive that they're killing people. Plus they can be easily ground down to dirty bomb that will WIPE OUT ALL OF NYC! So hero hustles to Cambodia and with ease destroys the mine and outwits the tons of evil guards posted there.
However, the meteor actually punched a hole through earth. So it hit Maine and went straight through to Cambodia. Waitress found the crater the next day...so how did the people in Cambodia manage to mine and make jewelry and sell it all over the world in a matter of hours? IT MAKES NO SENSE!
Events are so sped up that it makes me tired just thinking about. The waitress and the CIA guy (they meet up and join forces) travel all over the country, land, air, water, fighting off assassin and goverment and trying to stop alien death ray in the time it takes me to do my laundry.
March 29, 2010
When a friend offered to loan me this book, I had my doubts about taking it. Don’t get me wrong, I was an early fan of Preston’s works with Lincoln Child—Riptide and The Ice Limit being two of my favorites. I’ve been a lot more lukewarm with the duo’s works as separate authors, though. Preston’s last book, Blasphemy, I couldn’t finish. The Christian characters portrayed were so Hollywood stereotypical (meaning all were hypocrites, violent or ignorant) that I thought Preston had to be joking when he wrote them. I was like “seriously…have you ever met a Christian in your life…?”
Regardless, I decided to give Impact a look. This time I almost didn’t get through the first chapter. Being a bit of an amateur astronomer, I couldn’t believe that one of the main characters—who is supposedly star literate—is observing the Andromeda Galaxy in the Orion Constellation. In reality, the Andromeda Galaxy is nowhere near the Orion Constellation. They’re not even in the same part of the sky! Was this going to be another book filled with faulty research? Again, I contemplated putting the book away.
Thankfully, I pressed on. After that first chapter the science got a lot better. It was accurate, and even in the times where the author speculates, was at least plausible. Really made me wonder what happened with that first chapter….
From a reader’s perspective, though, the book is great. It moves quickly and has a really fun, fun plot. The two main characters are very likable (Wyman Ford having appeared in other of Preston’s works) and the villains were the kind you can truly despise. There’s a good variety of locations, some nice twists and a fair conclusion. I think the only complaint I might have with the plot is that there are a few too many nautical dilemmas for my taste. But that’s purely a preference thing—some people might love all those.
Overall Impact restored my faith in Douglas Preston as an author. Really enjoyed it, and look forward to what he has planned next. Well done.
(One final note, this book is sprinkled with R-rated language. More so than in previous Preston books, I think. I don’t know if I’d call it gratuitous, but enough that those who notice such things would notice. )
Regardless, I decided to give Impact a look. This time I almost didn’t get through the first chapter. Being a bit of an amateur astronomer, I couldn’t believe that one of the main characters—who is supposedly star literate—is observing the Andromeda Galaxy in the Orion Constellation. In reality, the Andromeda Galaxy is nowhere near the Orion Constellation. They’re not even in the same part of the sky! Was this going to be another book filled with faulty research? Again, I contemplated putting the book away.
Thankfully, I pressed on. After that first chapter the science got a lot better. It was accurate, and even in the times where the author speculates, was at least plausible. Really made me wonder what happened with that first chapter….
From a reader’s perspective, though, the book is great. It moves quickly and has a really fun, fun plot. The two main characters are very likable (Wyman Ford having appeared in other of Preston’s works) and the villains were the kind you can truly despise. There’s a good variety of locations, some nice twists and a fair conclusion. I think the only complaint I might have with the plot is that there are a few too many nautical dilemmas for my taste. But that’s purely a preference thing—some people might love all those.
Overall Impact restored my faith in Douglas Preston as an author. Really enjoyed it, and look forward to what he has planned next. Well done.
(One final note, this book is sprinkled with R-rated language. More so than in previous Preston books, I think. I don’t know if I’d call it gratuitous, but enough that those who notice such things would notice. )
June 10, 2018
I have read six Douglas Preston novels before and they never fail to entertain. Impact is an adventure that makes you think and succeeds at captivating the imagination of the reader. Abbey and Wyman Ford are the heroes of the tale with each playing their unique roles & using both a physical and intellectual prowess. Ford journeys to Cambodia to investigate a downed meteoroid that places a friend and himself in real danger, while Abbey stays closer to home pursued by a meth-induced treasure hunter & later an assassin. But there is a bigger problem. A dormant artifact in the Mars vicinity has been awakened and it appears to harbour aggressive intent. Can a Princeton dropout save the world?
February 4, 2022
This is the best of the series thus far. I had a great time reading this book. The action moves the plot at a breakneck pace, so it was always a joy to pick this one up and read. One more to go in the series. I hope it's at least as good as this one.
February 11, 2010
Impact follows a collection of different characters as their lives are irreparably changed by the impact of what appears to be a meteor/meteorite/metoriod??
I apologize for the spoilers throughout this review, however, this is the sort of book that you need to give everything away to explain just how poorly constructed the story is.
First of all the characters.
In part one of the story we have three protagonists: Abbey a young black woman just out of teenagedom, who smokes weed, makes smart-ass jokes and whose father is on her case about college. She is drawn into the story when she witnesses the plummeting meteor and steals her father’s boat to try and claim the fallen star.
Corso an academic with connections to mars explorations who stumbles across secret data on an alien artefact on mars
And Ford, a Jack Bower type ex-something “I don’t do that work anymore” guy who is asked to investigate a mine of rare metals that may be from out of this world.
These characters are a smooth blend of cliché and stereotype and come across flat. Abbey seemed to be the only character with any back-story to speak of, perhaps merely because she is young so still close to family. Otherwise the characters simply perform what they need to do to carry out the story, there is some attempt to spice up the narrative with ugly and antisocial antagonists and implausible sex but when key characters are poorly portrayed caricatures you can only imagine what the support cast are like.
In part two a serial killer antagonist is included in the mix, once again swinging the story towards thriller rather than sci-fi. Which leads onto the second problem, what genre is this book anyway?
If the answer is: “an awesome crossover sci-fi thriller” then the author should have spent more time trying to make the alien plot-line remotely believable, as it stands the story reads like an espionage thriller that just happens to all be about aliens. All the tension comes from human conflict and conspiracy, so why are there aliens at all? In the end the aliens don’t even matter at all, apparently having been extinct for the past forever, we don’t even see alien technology fall into the wrong hands or any other derivative plotline.
The extent of the research for this novel appears to be looking up the definition of dark matter. As if actually taking advice from “How not to write a novel” the characters frequently describe things in general terms so as to avoid the physical difficulties surrounding the concept of a ball of dark matter shooting through the middle of the earth, an alien weapon firing on earth from Demios (one of Mar’s moons) and reader’s ability to enjoy a novel that reads like a straight to TV (that’s right, even skipping DVD) movie.
Perhaps the worst part of the book was the worst twist/reveal I’ve ever experienced in a novel, or even on TV (and I’ve seen the Scooby Doo cartoons)
Towards the end when there is an obligatory reveal of one of the good (or at least benign) characters as a traitor we discover that an academic is actually a devout Muslim and has been selling space secrets to Pakistan.
Bear in mind that neither Pakistan or Islam had featured in the novel, or been introduced as a side issue or even philosophical discussion by the cardboard characters. Considering that there were about ten more plausible explanations of how and why an academic may betray space secrets like the rest of the book this ending just left me asking why go in the Muslim direction? Why are there aliens? Why did I read this book again?
October 4, 2016
DNF at pg 132........ run of the mill thriller with cardboard characters. Not for me at all is this, gave it a go in the hope that summit unusual would leap out...... not happening..
April 6, 2017
Start out on the coast of Maine with a brilliant 20-year-old Princeton dropout and her less-brilliant friend puzzling over a meteor shower, cut to CalTech where office politics and other shenanigans are in full flower at the National Propulsion Facility, add one former CIA agent dispatched to the backwoods of Cambodia by the President's National Science Advisor, mix in a tweedy contract killer, and pretty soon you're caught up in a pulse-pounding tale that will drag you irresistibly toward an astounding conclusion. And even there you'll find an ironic twist that will bring a smile to your face.
It's all totally preposterous, of course. The premise on which Impact is based is a lame refugee from science fiction. The ex-CIA guy -- a recurring character in some of Preston's novels -- is a little much to be believed. And that 20-year-old kid is miles off the probability charts. Somehow, though, it doesn't matter.
What matters, really, is that Impact is nonetheless a ripping good read. Douglas Preston has demonstrated once again his surpassing ability to structure a book that works really well. He is clearly a master of the thriller genre, and if his plot devices are sometimes far-fetched and his characters a little short of believable, so what? Impact is a lot of fun.
Douglas Preston is a best-selling writer with five novels and five nonfiction books of his own under his belt, as well as 16 other books co-authored with others, all but one of them suspense novels written with Lincoln Child. He is the brother of Richard Preston, a best-selling author and writer for The New Yorker.
It's all totally preposterous, of course. The premise on which Impact is based is a lame refugee from science fiction. The ex-CIA guy -- a recurring character in some of Preston's novels -- is a little much to be believed. And that 20-year-old kid is miles off the probability charts. Somehow, though, it doesn't matter.
What matters, really, is that Impact is nonetheless a ripping good read. Douglas Preston has demonstrated once again his surpassing ability to structure a book that works really well. He is clearly a master of the thriller genre, and if his plot devices are sometimes far-fetched and his characters a little short of believable, so what? Impact is a lot of fun.
Douglas Preston is a best-selling writer with five novels and five nonfiction books of his own under his belt, as well as 16 other books co-authored with others, all but one of them suspense novels written with Lincoln Child. He is the brother of Richard Preston, a best-selling author and writer for The New Yorker.
February 4, 2011
This book caught me from the 1st few pages and held my interest throughout as few others have. This is the best Preston book so far and the comparisons to Michael Crichton though lofty are vell deserved. The characters come alive and are believable. The story carefully crafted and very clever. Kudos to Mr. Preston. Reading this was a joy. I had trouble putting it down and many household duties were put on hold. Finding the next read that measures up won't be easy.
October 14, 2014
A fast-paced action-adventure novel. It's not high Literature, but it's tons of fun to read if you're in the mood for an exciting, quick read. I will be reading more by this author, because I really like his style.
July 19, 2021
Three separate stories which eventually merge into one as what is thought to be a meteorite plunges to earth off the coast of northeast America and another one lands near Cambodia. Starts slowly, but soon picks up and becomes quite good. I loved the little twist at the end. Recommended.
February 7, 2010
Coming off of Blasphemy, Preston's newest solo novel is a bit of a disappointment. It's the 3rd book featuring ex-CIA agent Wyman Ford (and the 4th in a series if you count the link between The Codex and Tyrannosaur Canyon), which suggests that there should be some continuity from book to book, right?
Well, Blasphemy ended with a startling bang, and I'd expect the next book in this series to mention it. But Preston didn't even give it a nod, which seemed like a wasted opportunity. After all, what's the point in using Wyman Ford again unless you want to bring his history with him? If you're not going to, why not just cook up another character? It wouldn't be difficult, especially since Wyman doesn't have much of a personality. He's just the sum of his actions; his character is solely comprised of what he does in each moment. And Preston should be better at creating memorable recurring characters than that - his books co-written with Lincoln Child are filled with them.
Also, the semi-main character Abbey is a total jerk. I think we're supposed to root for her, but she constantly bullies her best friend, steals from her dad, smokes dope and does shots in physically dangerous moments when she really needs her wits about her, and worries about losing her iPod when a hitman is chasing her. Another character, Mark Corso, is equally difficult to root for, and I can't tell if we're supposed to think he's being treated unfairly or not. I think we are, but he acts so bloody pompous and entitled that I'm just not sure.
The plot is typical Preston/Child - interesting and fast-paced and at times startling, but I would have enjoyed it much more if it hadn't been for the above problems. Probably because I know Preston is capable of more.
Well, Blasphemy ended with a startling bang, and I'd expect the next book in this series to mention it. But Preston didn't even give it a nod, which seemed like a wasted opportunity. After all, what's the point in using Wyman Ford again unless you want to bring his history with him? If you're not going to, why not just cook up another character? It wouldn't be difficult, especially since Wyman doesn't have much of a personality. He's just the sum of his actions; his character is solely comprised of what he does in each moment. And Preston should be better at creating memorable recurring characters than that - his books co-written with Lincoln Child are filled with them.
Also, the semi-main character Abbey is a total jerk. I think we're supposed to root for her, but she constantly bullies her best friend, steals from her dad, smokes dope and does shots in physically dangerous moments when she really needs her wits about her, and worries about losing her iPod when a hitman is chasing her. Another character, Mark Corso, is equally difficult to root for, and I can't tell if we're supposed to think he's being treated unfairly or not. I think we are, but he acts so bloody pompous and entitled that I'm just not sure.
The plot is typical Preston/Child - interesting and fast-paced and at times startling, but I would have enjoyed it much more if it hadn't been for the above problems. Probably because I know Preston is capable of more.
February 24, 2011
My God, this book was a chore to finish. The first half of the book seemed interesting, but only because I thought it was contributing to a greater storyline that would all come together in the end. But instead you end up with a handful of bland, predictable, poorly constructed characters weakly connected by events that are not important at all to the story.
A strange meteor impact spawns curiosity by amateur astronomers and CIA alike. Meanwhile, a survey of Mars is turning out some unusual gamma ray patterns. Turns out that the “meteor” was an exotic form of matter fired at Earth by an ancient, highly-advanced weapon located on one of the moons of Mars. The plot revolves around scientists discovering the truth behind these strange astronomical events, a government conspiracy to hide the information, and a surprisingly small amount of time about how to protect a very vulnerable planet.
Characters: Like I said, they’re all boring, predictable, and flat. Preston makes a weak attempt at giving them complex personalities, but ends up contradicting himself on multiple levels. The most annoying case was with the main character, Abbey. On one page, she’s an amateur astronomer well versed on everything from gamma rays to planetary orbits. Only a few pages later, she’ll bemoan not studying in class because she can’t remember basic information about Mars.
Plot: Mediocre at best. It could have been a good B-Grade science fiction novel, but it spends way too much time telling about things that have nothing to do with Earth’s impending doom. Towards the end of the book, I actually skipped two entire chapters because it was nothing but the main characters struggling to sail in a storm. Which reminds me, do all Preston novels have this much sailing in it? I couldn’t help but feel that he just read a “Sailing for Dummies” book, and he couldn’t wait to show off his nautical vocabulary.
Overall: The book tries to be too much at once. Science fiction, action, espionage, political thriller. Unfortunately, each element is so watered down that it succeeds as none of them. Whatever genre you’re looking for, I’d recommend skipping this one.
A strange meteor impact spawns curiosity by amateur astronomers and CIA alike. Meanwhile, a survey of Mars is turning out some unusual gamma ray patterns. Turns out that the “meteor” was an exotic form of matter fired at Earth by an ancient, highly-advanced weapon located on one of the moons of Mars. The plot revolves around scientists discovering the truth behind these strange astronomical events, a government conspiracy to hide the information, and a surprisingly small amount of time about how to protect a very vulnerable planet.
Characters: Like I said, they’re all boring, predictable, and flat. Preston makes a weak attempt at giving them complex personalities, but ends up contradicting himself on multiple levels. The most annoying case was with the main character, Abbey. On one page, she’s an amateur astronomer well versed on everything from gamma rays to planetary orbits. Only a few pages later, she’ll bemoan not studying in class because she can’t remember basic information about Mars.
Plot: Mediocre at best. It could have been a good B-Grade science fiction novel, but it spends way too much time telling about things that have nothing to do with Earth’s impending doom. Towards the end of the book, I actually skipped two entire chapters because it was nothing but the main characters struggling to sail in a storm. Which reminds me, do all Preston novels have this much sailing in it? I couldn’t help but feel that he just read a “Sailing for Dummies” book, and he couldn’t wait to show off his nautical vocabulary.
Overall: The book tries to be too much at once. Science fiction, action, espionage, political thriller. Unfortunately, each element is so watered down that it succeeds as none of them. Whatever genre you’re looking for, I’d recommend skipping this one.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 26, 2012
Preston is often compared to Michael Crichton and there is indeed a strong resemblance, but Impact does not strike me as a Crichton novel. It has all the elements but it is missing something.
First of all, much of the novel is unnecessary. Preston's attempt to achieve a dense plot made it feel like I was just wading through muck to get to the end. Preston adds complications just so they can be overcome, like cheap speed bump plotting devices designed to add tension but little else. Randall Worth's character for example is completely unnecessary. Ultimately, Worth has no serious effect on the story's outcome. The same goes for Wyman Ford's romp in Cambodia. The setting is beautifully rendered but what was it all for? To find the crater? Crichton would have flown us in on a helicopter to find the crater, skipping the unnecessary melodrama involving the Khmer Rouge. Ford's ultimate decision while at the site, and his escape from the Khmer Rouge, are both stupid and absurd. No CIA agent would make such a dumb decision and escape with his life.
While the science in Impact was interesting, there wasn't enough of it. The novel only barely held my interest as we ran from an assassin, trapsed around in Cambodia, and spent chapter after chapter on choppy seas reading descriptions of every damn wave. I wanted to read about the machine and aliens, not the conspiracy and the car chases. When Preston finally got around to the science, it was hurried and unsatisfying, as if he couldn't wait to get back to the spy stuff. Worst of all, the final unveiling of the villain was so absurd that it almost had me laughing. Really? All of that trouble was caused by that guy? And for such a dumb, unrealistic reason? I have seen more believable villains on Scooby Doo.
Overall, Impact just didn't do it for me. It was too much spy fiction and too little creativity or intellect. I think Preston should stick to collaborating with Lincoln Child and, please Douglas, after Riptide, The Ice Limit and now Impact, I have had enough stormy seascapes for a lifetime.
First of all, much of the novel is unnecessary. Preston's attempt to achieve a dense plot made it feel like I was just wading through muck to get to the end. Preston adds complications just so they can be overcome, like cheap speed bump plotting devices designed to add tension but little else. Randall Worth's character for example is completely unnecessary. Ultimately, Worth has no serious effect on the story's outcome. The same goes for Wyman Ford's romp in Cambodia. The setting is beautifully rendered but what was it all for? To find the crater? Crichton would have flown us in on a helicopter to find the crater, skipping the unnecessary melodrama involving the Khmer Rouge. Ford's ultimate decision while at the site, and his escape from the Khmer Rouge, are both stupid and absurd. No CIA agent would make such a dumb decision and escape with his life.
While the science in Impact was interesting, there wasn't enough of it. The novel only barely held my interest as we ran from an assassin, trapsed around in Cambodia, and spent chapter after chapter on choppy seas reading descriptions of every damn wave. I wanted to read about the machine and aliens, not the conspiracy and the car chases. When Preston finally got around to the science, it was hurried and unsatisfying, as if he couldn't wait to get back to the spy stuff. Worst of all, the final unveiling of the villain was so absurd that it almost had me laughing. Really? All of that trouble was caused by that guy? And for such a dumb, unrealistic reason? I have seen more believable villains on Scooby Doo.
Overall, Impact just didn't do it for me. It was too much spy fiction and too little creativity or intellect. I think Preston should stick to collaborating with Lincoln Child and, please Douglas, after Riptide, The Ice Limit and now Impact, I have had enough stormy seascapes for a lifetime.
March 1, 2017
wtf?
almost expected tsoukalos and his crazy do to show up for the punchline
p292: bracing himself, his legs apart and the glock desert eagle in both hands, he aimed at abbey's head and squeezed the trigger.
you're kidding, right?
after outfitting axlp a custom les baer, this one's outright glaring;
thinking of siccing imi on you
p356: the winds howled, lightning flashed, and the thunder mingled with the crashing of surf on the shore to create an continuous roar of sound.
almost expected tsoukalos and his crazy do to show up for the punchline
p292: bracing himself, his legs apart and the glock desert eagle in both hands, he aimed at abbey's head and squeezed the trigger.
you're kidding, right?
after outfitting axlp a custom les baer, this one's outright glaring;
thinking of siccing imi on you
p356: the winds howled, lightning flashed, and the thunder mingled with the crashing of surf on the shore to create an continuous roar of sound.
October 7, 2023
4.5 stars
This was my favorite of the 4 books (I’m a bit late in writing this review). Yes, it’s also one of the most far fetched in terms of the science, but that’s okay—I still really enjoyed it. I think it’s partly because I really liked the main character, Abby, and the friendship she had with Jackie, who would be by her side even if she didn’t agree with what she was doing. I liked how Wyman saw there was something amazing about her and really listened to her even as others in her town thought her nuts. While I don’t think her dad really understood her, the love between them was genuine and I really liked that.
The science, as I said, was extremely far-fetched, and the ending was just a bit too neat, but I still liked it, lol. Overall, the story was fast-paced, exciting, and held my interest from start to finish. I think overall I prefer the Pendergast series, but this series is a lot of fun as well.
This was my favorite of the 4 books (I’m a bit late in writing this review). Yes, it’s also one of the most far fetched in terms of the science, but that’s okay—I still really enjoyed it. I think it’s partly because I really liked the main character, Abby, and the friendship she had with Jackie, who would be by her side even if she didn’t agree with what she was doing. I liked how Wyman saw there was something amazing about her and really listened to her even as others in her town thought her nuts. While I don’t think her dad really understood her, the love between them was genuine and I really liked that.
The science, as I said, was extremely far-fetched, and the ending was just a bit too neat, but I still liked it, lol. Overall, the story was fast-paced, exciting, and held my interest from start to finish. I think overall I prefer the Pendergast series, but this series is a lot of fun as well.
May 12, 2020
It's Douglas Preston time again. Preston's oeuvre is mystery thrillers involving the unusual, the odd and the curious. In this spirit, Impact (2010)—the third in the Wyman Ford series—involves a meteor, NASA, some hot and radioactive stones, geopolitical intrigue, and lobster fishing in Maine.
The Beginning
Impact opens with Abbey Straw, a most unusual young woman living with her lobsterman father on one on Maine's many remote islands near Penobscot Bay. Abbey is different because she's very bright, having attended Princeton (but not finishing), she is thinking beyond the lobster-fishing life to, perhaps, astronomy—and she's the only black girl in a lily-white world. These all make her a standout in Round Pond, Maine on the shore of Muscongous Bay.
Abbey buys a telescope on eBay and, with Jackie Spann, a friend, she sets it up at the town dock one evening to gaze at the Andromeda Cluster. She starts the camera and as it is running a large meteor whooshes over their heads and impacts on a nearby island; it's all on film. Abbey has determined from the path of the meteor that it must have hit on one of five islands. Abbey and Jackie hop onto Marea, Abbey's father's lobster boat, and they head out into Muscongous Bay to investigate.
Unknown to them they are being tracked by a local fellow named Randall Worth, a despicable cad, addict, and alcoholic whom Abbey had once bedded. He now thinks she is all his, but she's realized that he's a mean shit and racist to boot: not particularly good grounds for an ongoing salt and pepper relationship. Worth is following Abbey and Jackie because he thinks they've got a map to a long-sought hidden pirate treasure on one of the islands. He is angry, and he is armed.
The scene shifts to an ex-CIA agent named Wyman Ford. Ford is the White House science advisor's go-to man for investigations of a scientific nature. Stanton Lockwood, the president's science advisor, has learned of some highly radioactive topaz-like stones, called "honey" that are circulating. They are fashioned into necklaces and other jewelry and are killing their owners. Lockwood wants to know their origin and how they came into the public arena. Wyman traces them to a gem dealer in Cambodia and heads off to Asia to pursue the lead.
Another scene shift, now to NASA's National Propulsion Facility. A scientist named Mark Corso has just been hired to work on a Mars mission. His predecessor, Jason Freeman, had been fired for becoming distracted from the main mission and devoting time to an unapproved project—some folderol about anomalies in Martian gamma ray data. After getting the axe, Freeman was murdered in a home robbery gone bad—or so it was thought.
Corso, using Freeman's data, has identified a pattern of gamma radiation on Mars that indicates a point source—a specific location generating the rays. Gamma rays are extremely high radiation associated with massive explosions. Barring an unshielded nuclear reactor casually left on Mars by humans, the reasons for this radiation could be an alien presence on Mars or, even more threatening, a mini-black hole on Mars's surface that will eat Mars and, when the planet collapses, create a solar-system destroying explosion.
The Middle
Wyman Ford is in Cambodia tracing the location of the mine that produces "honey." He is assisted by a Cambodian named Koth and they are shown the way to the mine by a Buddhist abbot at a mountain monastery. The mine turns out to be an asteroid crater deep in the Cambodian hills. It is operated by ex-Khmer Rouge who have conscripted local peasants as slaves. The peasants are dying hand-over-fist from radiation, starvation, exhaustion and execution.
The head man at the mine is the notorious Brother Six from Khmer Rouge heydays (there really was a "Brother Two" in the Khmer Rouge). Ford convinces him that the CIA is prepared to attack to close the mine. The warning will be that CIA drones will send missiles into the mountains as a warning. When those missiles explode there will be a short time for the miners and their bosses to escape. Soon explosions in the nearby hills convince Brother Six and he shuts down the mine and departs. But the explosions were a deception—TNT set off in the hills by Ford's assistant. Ford and his assistant then release the slaves and blow up the mining operation.
Abbey and Jackie are still checking out the Maine islands, tailed in deep Maine fog by Worth. At Shark Island, the last island on their list, they find a small crater about a foot across and start digging to recover the meteor. Worth hears their exultation when they find the crater and, believing that the treasure has been found, takes a hit of meth, sidles up to the anchored Marea, and disables it: Abbey and Jackie are trapped at Shark Island. And Worth has his faithful .44 revolver and plans to "finish the bitches."
We will be surprised when we learn that the Maine crater and the Cambodia crater are connected: whatever hit the Earth in Maine exited in Cambodia; it passed through the 8,000 miles of primeval rock before continuing on its way across the universe. It also must have consisted of "strange matter," a type of antimatter that annihilates matter. This is something VERY new, and we should pay attention!
Mark Corso becomes captivated by the gamma ray emissions, as had his predecessor. He ignores his boss's demand that he drop the gamma ray investigation and makes the gamma rays the center of very first presentation to the NPL group. But his presentation has a fatal flaw that discredits Mark and gives his boss the excuse to sack him. Mark realizes that his "error" was easily corrected—the gamma ray source is not on Mars but on its tiny moon, Deimos. And using data extraction methods Mark discovers that the source is not natural—it is a "man-made" machine of some type, perhaps left by aliens. Corso is fired for insubordination and failing to do his job. He soon dies in another "home robbery."
The End
So here's where we stand. In the Killing Fields of Cambodia a deadly gem is being extracted from an asteroid crater by really bad people; in Maine an asteroid crater brings Abbey and Jackie face-to-face with a killer; in Houston an ex-NASA employee discovers that a "man-made" machine is emitting gamma rays from one of Mars's moons. Is this an existential threat? Will our lobster-ladies die? Will Wyman Ford put it all together and save the planet—again?
Read On. The book has some consistency problems, but all-in-all it was an entertaining read and once you've bought into the premise of aliens on Mars leaving machinery behind, consistency is the least of your problems.
A final note: The book has a memorable line that one can use in many contexts. It comes from the dialogue at a White House meeting on what to do:
The Beginning
Impact opens with Abbey Straw, a most unusual young woman living with her lobsterman father on one on Maine's many remote islands near Penobscot Bay. Abbey is different because she's very bright, having attended Princeton (but not finishing), she is thinking beyond the lobster-fishing life to, perhaps, astronomy—and she's the only black girl in a lily-white world. These all make her a standout in Round Pond, Maine on the shore of Muscongous Bay.
Abbey buys a telescope on eBay and, with Jackie Spann, a friend, she sets it up at the town dock one evening to gaze at the Andromeda Cluster. She starts the camera and as it is running a large meteor whooshes over their heads and impacts on a nearby island; it's all on film. Abbey has determined from the path of the meteor that it must have hit on one of five islands. Abbey and Jackie hop onto Marea, Abbey's father's lobster boat, and they head out into Muscongous Bay to investigate.
Unknown to them they are being tracked by a local fellow named Randall Worth, a despicable cad, addict, and alcoholic whom Abbey had once bedded. He now thinks she is all his, but she's realized that he's a mean shit and racist to boot: not particularly good grounds for an ongoing salt and pepper relationship. Worth is following Abbey and Jackie because he thinks they've got a map to a long-sought hidden pirate treasure on one of the islands. He is angry, and he is armed.
The scene shifts to an ex-CIA agent named Wyman Ford. Ford is the White House science advisor's go-to man for investigations of a scientific nature. Stanton Lockwood, the president's science advisor, has learned of some highly radioactive topaz-like stones, called "honey" that are circulating. They are fashioned into necklaces and other jewelry and are killing their owners. Lockwood wants to know their origin and how they came into the public arena. Wyman traces them to a gem dealer in Cambodia and heads off to Asia to pursue the lead.
Another scene shift, now to NASA's National Propulsion Facility. A scientist named Mark Corso has just been hired to work on a Mars mission. His predecessor, Jason Freeman, had been fired for becoming distracted from the main mission and devoting time to an unapproved project—some folderol about anomalies in Martian gamma ray data. After getting the axe, Freeman was murdered in a home robbery gone bad—or so it was thought.
Corso, using Freeman's data, has identified a pattern of gamma radiation on Mars that indicates a point source—a specific location generating the rays. Gamma rays are extremely high radiation associated with massive explosions. Barring an unshielded nuclear reactor casually left on Mars by humans, the reasons for this radiation could be an alien presence on Mars or, even more threatening, a mini-black hole on Mars's surface that will eat Mars and, when the planet collapses, create a solar-system destroying explosion.
The Middle
Wyman Ford is in Cambodia tracing the location of the mine that produces "honey." He is assisted by a Cambodian named Koth and they are shown the way to the mine by a Buddhist abbot at a mountain monastery. The mine turns out to be an asteroid crater deep in the Cambodian hills. It is operated by ex-Khmer Rouge who have conscripted local peasants as slaves. The peasants are dying hand-over-fist from radiation, starvation, exhaustion and execution.
The head man at the mine is the notorious Brother Six from Khmer Rouge heydays (there really was a "Brother Two" in the Khmer Rouge). Ford convinces him that the CIA is prepared to attack to close the mine. The warning will be that CIA drones will send missiles into the mountains as a warning. When those missiles explode there will be a short time for the miners and their bosses to escape. Soon explosions in the nearby hills convince Brother Six and he shuts down the mine and departs. But the explosions were a deception—TNT set off in the hills by Ford's assistant. Ford and his assistant then release the slaves and blow up the mining operation.
Abbey and Jackie are still checking out the Maine islands, tailed in deep Maine fog by Worth. At Shark Island, the last island on their list, they find a small crater about a foot across and start digging to recover the meteor. Worth hears their exultation when they find the crater and, believing that the treasure has been found, takes a hit of meth, sidles up to the anchored Marea, and disables it: Abbey and Jackie are trapped at Shark Island. And Worth has his faithful .44 revolver and plans to "finish the bitches."
We will be surprised when we learn that the Maine crater and the Cambodia crater are connected: whatever hit the Earth in Maine exited in Cambodia; it passed through the 8,000 miles of primeval rock before continuing on its way across the universe. It also must have consisted of "strange matter," a type of antimatter that annihilates matter. This is something VERY new, and we should pay attention!
Mark Corso becomes captivated by the gamma ray emissions, as had his predecessor. He ignores his boss's demand that he drop the gamma ray investigation and makes the gamma rays the center of very first presentation to the NPL group. But his presentation has a fatal flaw that discredits Mark and gives his boss the excuse to sack him. Mark realizes that his "error" was easily corrected—the gamma ray source is not on Mars but on its tiny moon, Deimos. And using data extraction methods Mark discovers that the source is not natural—it is a "man-made" machine of some type, perhaps left by aliens. Corso is fired for insubordination and failing to do his job. He soon dies in another "home robbery."
The End
So here's where we stand. In the Killing Fields of Cambodia a deadly gem is being extracted from an asteroid crater by really bad people; in Maine an asteroid crater brings Abbey and Jackie face-to-face with a killer; in Houston an ex-NASA employee discovers that a "man-made" machine is emitting gamma rays from one of Mars's moons. Is this an existential threat? Will our lobster-ladies die? Will Wyman Ford put it all together and save the planet—again?
Read On. The book has some consistency problems, but all-in-all it was an entertaining read and once you've bought into the premise of aliens on Mars leaving machinery behind, consistency is the least of your problems.
A final note: The book has a memorable line that one can use in many contexts. It comes from the dialogue at a White House meeting on what to do:
We're like a cockroach committee debating how to get rid of the exterminator.
January 11, 2010
An ex-CIA operative is sent to a mysterious mine, while a young woman hunts for a meteorite and a scientist is discouraged from following up on his murdered mentor's research. Their stories relate in a way that reveals an unprecedented threat to the earth. This is a fast, light read that should appeal to those who like thrillers with some science thrown in.
I really enjoyed the setting descriptions and Ford's investigation, but the characters were thin and some aspects of the pacing seemed off. For example, Abbey sees the streak in the sky and it feels like she goes off to find the meteorite fairly quickly, but some time must have passed in order for the Cambodian mine to have been operating long enough for the gems to come to official attention. At one point an escaped prisoner mentions that working in the mine harmed her eyesight, how long did that take?
At least one of the action sequences felt awkward and unnecessary, as if it was largely an excuse to help bring Abbey to Ford's attention. And the most interesting, unique aspect of the entire story got barely any attention, other than a bit of scientific chatter about the phenomenon. I think that the author lost a great opportunity to focus more on the reaction of both the characters and the world to what was happening.
Somehow the ending managed to feel interesting and anti-climactic at the same time. I would have liked it better if one character had, earlier in the book, shown much interest in the naval warfare their decision referenced, because it seemed to come completely out of left field.
I really enjoyed the setting descriptions and Ford's investigation, but the characters were thin and some aspects of the pacing seemed off. For example, Abbey sees the streak in the sky and it feels like she goes off to find the meteorite fairly quickly, but some time must have passed in order for the Cambodian mine to have been operating long enough for the gems to come to official attention. At one point an escaped prisoner mentions that working in the mine harmed her eyesight, how long did that take?
At least one of the action sequences felt awkward and unnecessary, as if it was largely an excuse to help bring Abbey to Ford's attention. And the most interesting, unique aspect of the entire story got barely any attention, other than a bit of scientific chatter about the phenomenon. I think that the author lost a great opportunity to focus more on the reaction of both the characters and the world to what was happening.
Somehow the ending managed to feel interesting and anti-climactic at the same time. I would have liked it better if one character had, earlier in the book, shown much interest in the naval warfare their decision referenced, because it seemed to come completely out of left field.
June 7, 2023
I like the other works of this writer quite a lot, and I will say that this storyline did not appeal to my personal interests (in other words, I am not interested in anything to do with outer space). So if you like space stuff, you may enjoy it! I liked the setting and the scenes in Maine. It was a bit frustrating that the main character is described as being super beautiful but yet she ate junk food a lot and seemed to have a low opinion of herself. Anyway, it wasn't a winner for me but I am still a fan of the author.
February 12, 2010
I loved this one. Brilliant, exciting, surprising, funny, thrilling, scary, apocalyptic, and so much more. The simple story of 3 very random and different people from 3 very different places all being connected to a strange meteor that crashed into Earth.
Mainly told from the three character's perspectives, it starts out with Abbey: an African-American small town waitress that dropped out of Princeton because she focused too much on Astronomy and Physics classes and not on her intended med-school plan. She and her friend, Jackie, witness the fall and crash of a large meteor onto a local island off the coast of Maine, and go scouting for the crater.
Wyman Ford, ex CIA, now working for the President's head science adviser, gets a super secret mission to Cambodia - to find and record the location of yet another meteor crash. The crashes seem to be leaving behind rare, yet dangerously radioactive, gemstones that are selling for top dollar on the black market. On finding the site, he discovers a Middle Eastern war tyrant has taken hold of the crash site and is forcing women, men and children to mine the gemstones, slowly and surely killing them.
Mark Corso is working for the National Propulsion Facility in southern California. His job is to go through the thousands of data that is retrieved from a satellite that orbits Mars. He receives a classified hard drive from his late boss, who was decapitated allegedly by a homeless man in a home robbery, with pictures of a strange device on Mars' moon Deimos. He soon discovers that the meteor's trajectory suggests an origination from Mars, specifically Deimos. And that it was not a meteor at all, but something far more dangerous. He quickly figures out that his boss was murdered by a shady government agency that wants to keep these world-altering secrets under wraps. And they're willing to stop at nothing to keep it that way.
All of these stories meet up, characters joining forces in the most unlikely of ways. And, as i always do, i give major props to Mr. Preston for not being afraid to kill off main characters. You never really know if even the most important of characters will survive, or, for that matter, the entire human race.
And speaking of the matter of our extinction, the story and its implications were really eye opening to me. I don't want to give away spoilers, because the events in the book are of the "cover the next paragraph because i don't wanna know what happens!" kind. The resolution is satisfying, not anti-climactic (which i was afraid it would be because the REALLY crazy stuff starts with about 10 pages left).
Well paced, great characters to connect with and root far, terrifying villains (human and non human) to be afraid of, and a plot that, honestly, seems like it could happen any day now. Oh and it actually had an ORIGINAL idea of Earth's destruction. There are no silly alien metal robot contraptions and cliched "take me to your leader!"s here. You really only get 5 words from the non human race. And in this book's case less, is truly and honestly, more.
Mainly told from the three character's perspectives, it starts out with Abbey: an African-American small town waitress that dropped out of Princeton because she focused too much on Astronomy and Physics classes and not on her intended med-school plan. She and her friend, Jackie, witness the fall and crash of a large meteor onto a local island off the coast of Maine, and go scouting for the crater.
Wyman Ford, ex CIA, now working for the President's head science adviser, gets a super secret mission to Cambodia - to find and record the location of yet another meteor crash. The crashes seem to be leaving behind rare, yet dangerously radioactive, gemstones that are selling for top dollar on the black market. On finding the site, he discovers a Middle Eastern war tyrant has taken hold of the crash site and is forcing women, men and children to mine the gemstones, slowly and surely killing them.
Mark Corso is working for the National Propulsion Facility in southern California. His job is to go through the thousands of data that is retrieved from a satellite that orbits Mars. He receives a classified hard drive from his late boss, who was decapitated allegedly by a homeless man in a home robbery, with pictures of a strange device on Mars' moon Deimos. He soon discovers that the meteor's trajectory suggests an origination from Mars, specifically Deimos. And that it was not a meteor at all, but something far more dangerous. He quickly figures out that his boss was murdered by a shady government agency that wants to keep these world-altering secrets under wraps. And they're willing to stop at nothing to keep it that way.
All of these stories meet up, characters joining forces in the most unlikely of ways. And, as i always do, i give major props to Mr. Preston for not being afraid to kill off main characters. You never really know if even the most important of characters will survive, or, for that matter, the entire human race.
And speaking of the matter of our extinction, the story and its implications were really eye opening to me. I don't want to give away spoilers, because the events in the book are of the "cover the next paragraph because i don't wanna know what happens!" kind. The resolution is satisfying, not anti-climactic (which i was afraid it would be because the REALLY crazy stuff starts with about 10 pages left).
Well paced, great characters to connect with and root far, terrifying villains (human and non human) to be afraid of, and a plot that, honestly, seems like it could happen any day now. Oh and it actually had an ORIGINAL idea of Earth's destruction. There are no silly alien metal robot contraptions and cliched "take me to your leader!"s here. You really only get 5 words from the non human race. And in this book's case less, is truly and honestly, more.
October 29, 2010
A word of warning to new readers- if you haven't read Douglas Preston's other books in the Wyman Ford series then you will be missing out on a little. `Impact' works well as a standalone, but to get the full story on Ford you'll have to read all of the books preceding this one. In fact, I recommend that you read the previous books first. This isn't a bad story, but it's not Preston's strongest work to date.
This book find Wyman Ford being called in to investigate radioactive gems that have been showing up in Asia & somehow ended up on the neck of a politician's wife. Meanwhile, an intelligent college dropout goes searching with her father's boat for a fallen meteorite, only to discover that not only is there more to it than she'd thought but that she's also being followed. But that's not all- behind these two individuals there's also a third person- a researcher for NPF who has discovered something that's related to both of these seemingly unconnected events... something that could threaten life as everyone knows it.
I have to admit that I was a teensy bit disappointed that there was absolutely no mention of the previous events in Blasphemy. While I can see where it wouldn't be a huge mention, the previous book made it seem like the religious movement at the end of the previous book was quite popular & highly publicized- so why no mention in this one?
I do like the characters in this book for the most part, although at times I got a little frustrated with how much the book jumps around. One point we have Abbey, the next Ford & then the NPF researcher Corso. While this allowed for dramatic suspense at times, it just didn't link together as well as I would have liked it to. It also didn't give me a good sense of either of the new characters, especially Abbey, which is a shame considering how important she's supposed to be in this book. The plotline is decent, but again- the jumping around kind of got on my nerves.
I guess the bottom line is that fans of Preston's work will love this, but I can't help but think that some new readers may not be as enthralled with this as they might be with some of Preston's earlier works or any of the stuff he's written with Child. This isn't a book to ignore, but it is something that some may want to wait until paperback for.
This book find Wyman Ford being called in to investigate radioactive gems that have been showing up in Asia & somehow ended up on the neck of a politician's wife. Meanwhile, an intelligent college dropout goes searching with her father's boat for a fallen meteorite, only to discover that not only is there more to it than she'd thought but that she's also being followed. But that's not all- behind these two individuals there's also a third person- a researcher for NPF who has discovered something that's related to both of these seemingly unconnected events... something that could threaten life as everyone knows it.
I have to admit that I was a teensy bit disappointed that there was absolutely no mention of the previous events in Blasphemy. While I can see where it wouldn't be a huge mention, the previous book made it seem like the religious movement at the end of the previous book was quite popular & highly publicized- so why no mention in this one?
I do like the characters in this book for the most part, although at times I got a little frustrated with how much the book jumps around. One point we have Abbey, the next Ford & then the NPF researcher Corso. While this allowed for dramatic suspense at times, it just didn't link together as well as I would have liked it to. It also didn't give me a good sense of either of the new characters, especially Abbey, which is a shame considering how important she's supposed to be in this book. The plotline is decent, but again- the jumping around kind of got on my nerves.
I guess the bottom line is that fans of Preston's work will love this, but I can't help but think that some new readers may not be as enthralled with this as they might be with some of Preston's earlier works or any of the stuff he's written with Child. This isn't a book to ignore, but it is something that some may want to wait until paperback for.
January 24, 2011
I knew going into "Impact" that this book was going to be a crapshoot. I have enjoyed almost everything that Douglas Preston as written with Lincoln Child, but only "Codex" has worked for me when he has written on his own. However, I once again took the plunge, buying this book before I was scheduled to sit around the courthouse, waiting to be called for jury duty. The book passed the time, but that was about all that I can say positive about it.
"Impact" starts out with three different plot threads that get pulled together rather quickly. The synopsis on the back of the book implies that these threads will continue throughout the book, but they don't. By the halfway point, there is only one narrative thread, by far the least interesting of the three. The others seem to be filler at best, or ways to get information to the reader that the main characters don't have at the worst.
The plot centers around what seems to be two simultaneous meteor strikes, one off the coast of Maine, and one in Cambodia. A former CIA operative goes off to Cambodia, searching for the source of radioactive gemstones while a female college dropout goes searching for the meteorite in Maine, hoping to find and sell it. Mix in a researcher who has discovered a gamma ray emission from Mars, and you have the makings of a decent little potboiler. Unfortunately, none of the characters have any personality, and there is not just one, but two boats piloted by the Maine characters that get sunk. I would think that an author would be able to avoid repeating themselves that blatantly, but... there you go.
The ending of the book is another sore spot. The "gotcha" at the end is kept secret from the public at large, but it makes no sense to keep it secret. Those who know the real end result of the events of the book gain nothing by keeping them secret, and actually risk harming the world tremendously by keeping their mouths shut. Not to mention that for one of the characters in on the secret, it is completely out of character. Just 50 pages earlier, he was sending DVDs and hard drives off to the press so something much more damaging couldn't be kept quiet. The holes in the narrative logic are maddening.
To conclude, "Impact" is quite annoying, and I'd recommend that readers avoid it. There's little to recommend it, and much to avoid. Stay away.
"Impact" starts out with three different plot threads that get pulled together rather quickly. The synopsis on the back of the book implies that these threads will continue throughout the book, but they don't. By the halfway point, there is only one narrative thread, by far the least interesting of the three. The others seem to be filler at best, or ways to get information to the reader that the main characters don't have at the worst.
The plot centers around what seems to be two simultaneous meteor strikes, one off the coast of Maine, and one in Cambodia. A former CIA operative goes off to Cambodia, searching for the source of radioactive gemstones while a female college dropout goes searching for the meteorite in Maine, hoping to find and sell it. Mix in a researcher who has discovered a gamma ray emission from Mars, and you have the makings of a decent little potboiler. Unfortunately, none of the characters have any personality, and there is not just one, but two boats piloted by the Maine characters that get sunk. I would think that an author would be able to avoid repeating themselves that blatantly, but... there you go.
The ending of the book is another sore spot. The "gotcha" at the end is kept secret from the public at large, but it makes no sense to keep it secret. Those who know the real end result of the events of the book gain nothing by keeping them secret, and actually risk harming the world tremendously by keeping their mouths shut. Not to mention that for one of the characters in on the secret, it is completely out of character. Just 50 pages earlier, he was sending DVDs and hard drives off to the press so something much more damaging couldn't be kept quiet. The holes in the narrative logic are maddening.
To conclude, "Impact" is quite annoying, and I'd recommend that readers avoid it. There's little to recommend it, and much to avoid. Stay away.
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