The Sacred Vault

Nina Wilde & Eddie Chase #6

by Andy McDermott

Nina Wilde and Eddie Chase are back in another epic contemporary adventure thriller. As the story opens Michelangelo's David is stolen from its plinth in Florence, Italy, in the latest of a series of audacious raids of the world's greatest treasures. When another treasure, the Talonor Codex - an account of the travels of a great Atlantean explorer, which suggests a link between the ancient Hindu civilisation of India and the Atlanteans - is stolen from an exhibition in San Francisco, Nina and Eddie join the adventure. They must now race across the world from India to Nicaragua, the Himalayas to Greenland, to find the vault of Shiva before the man who has stolen the Codex. For the Codex says that inside the vault lies the Shiva Purana, the written words and chronicles of Shiva, the ancient Hindu god of destruction and transformation. A treasure that is beyond the world's wildest imaginings, but which may also be the catalyst for its annihilation.

Genres: Adventure, Thriller, Fiction, Action, Mystery, Mystery Thriller, Suspense

544 pages, Hardcover

First published July 8, 2010

About the author

Andy McDermott was born in Halifax, West Yorkshire, and now lives in Bournemouth. As a journalist and magazine editor, amongst other titles he edited DVD Review and the iconoclastic film publication Hotdog. Andy is now a full-time writer.

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

I still am 100% for this series.

I say that because I sense that some fans are probably dropping off a bit, both from reviews I've seen here and the fact that it's the 6th book in a series which usually leads to a decrease in popularity or quality. Well, I disagree. I think this is just as good as the first and is still extremely fast paced and fun.

My only complaint was that the villain was SO obvious that I could tell who the main villain was the moment they walked into the story. But then I realized that it's supposed to be super obvious and that it didn't matter. Once I accepted that all that was important was that the story kept moving along at a break neck speed I was very happy with the rest of the book.

I look forward to the next book and wonder if the foreshadowing that he's been giving for the past three books will finally wrap up in that one or if we have one more left before finding out what the heck is with those purple statues. Either way I'm in it for the long haul. Next stop: Lost City of Gold.

[Thibault Busschots · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great action-packed treasure hunt. A solid plot that eventually ends in a fascinating snowy Himalayan setting.

[Tyson Adams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Australia has Matthew Reilly. The US has Clive Cussler and James Rollins. The UK has Andy McDermott.

The Sacred Vault is Andy's sixth Nina and Eddie adventure and they just keep the adrenalin pumping as much as ever. I've met archaeologists, they make soil scientists seem exciting by comparison. Yet the world has more archaeologist adventurers than any other science: Indiana Jones, Jack West Jnr, Dirk Pitt, Nina and Eddie, the list goes on. But who can blame writers for picking archaeologists over the other sciences, ancient stuff doesn't go in the sci-fi section.

Andy has served up another thriller that doesn't let up. Much like Reilly, he knows how to keep you glued to the page and blow things up. What I also like is the humour he manages to weave into the dialogue, making for a fun and exciting read. Something I noticed with this book in the series was that as the action peaked, so did the amount of witty banter.

This is definitely a book (and series) for thriller and adventure fans.

[Meredith · Rating 2 out of 5]

More or less I enjoyed the adventure. There just happened to be bits that weren't even internally consistent, which always frustrates me.

Like the amazing cat burglars who intentionally work out every detail of their heist, including how such things work best when the fewest people are around. Until their final heist, which is right in the middle of a high profile gathering. And every so shocking, it doesn't go smoothly. Does it make for wild action scenes? Sure, but oi.

[Jeff Lyons · Rating 5 out of 5]

I actually read this one before reading any of Andy McDermott's earlier books - mainly because I found it on sale somewhere and thought...what the hey? But I immediately fell in love with Eddie Chase and Nina Wilde. It started out a tad slow with a social event but then Eddie was chasing after a bunch of bad guys within a dozen or so pages. The words that best describe McDermott's books are action-packed, improbable, thrilling, and a good laugh. The characters of Eddie and Nina are the kind of folks I'd love to hang out with for a few beers. As I mentioned, I read this one first but it impressed me so much I had to go find the other books. McDermott is incredibly prolific. In about three years he's pounded out six excellent, exhausting books. And at this writing, there are at least two more on the way. Can't wait.

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars

[Jeff Dickison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Long on action, short on sense. McDermott is one of the top action writers around, unfortunately the plot is aimed at the 11-year old that resides inside all of us. To think that anyone could survive an airplane shot down by a missile is a bit much. Recommended only to action junkies and their inter 11-year old.

[Kristen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love this series! It's like an action movie in book format and it's just so much fun!

Eddie Chase is one of the most hilarious, entertaining characters ever and I absolutely adore him! Aside from him being completely blase and casual about the ludicrous situations he and his now wife Nina Wilde keep ending up embroiled in, he kicks ass with every bad guy he goes up against, and in defiance of all the laws of probability he continues to stay alive and keep Nina alive too. He also is the corner of the absolute best curse I've ever heard: "buggeration and fuckery", which he utters everytime the craziness overtakes him and I laugh out loud everytime he says it.

Nina is no slouch either. She may be an archeologist and academic, but she can hold her own along with Eddie on all their adventures and she manages to take in stride the death-defying situations her work keeps getting them into.

I get the books in this series on audio format and the narrator is just spectacular! He totally brings the characters - particularly Eddie - completely to life and makes the adventures so much fun to go along!

I get one of the books in this series when I just want exciting dramatic rip-roaring fun that entertains me and doesn't ask anything but that I buckle up and hold on for the ride. I definitely plan to continue with this series.

[Plamen Kolev · Rating 4 out of 5]

Andy McDermott knows how to write a great non-stop action page-turner, while still preserving at least a sense of credibility and realism. Yes, the main characters always surviving against the odds, in the last possible moment is a bit too predictable, hence why I cannot give 5 stars. However, I still throughly enjoyed the book and the journey around the world, and Nina Wilde and Eddie Chase are two of the most likeable characters in any book series I have discovered. Looking forward to my next meeting with them and the series.

[Mats · Rating 4 out of 5]

Den Hellige Krypt er spennende fra start til slutt! Lett å henge seg på og få fatt på handlingen. Det er en kreativ og spennende historie, med mange innslag som bærer preg av historie og kultur. Tidvis noe unødvendig dialog, men definitivt en veldig gjennomført bok.

[Sheridan Miles · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book.
Well written, captured my attending straight off the bat and kept me reading with enthusiasm all the way to the end.

[Suresh · Rating 1 out of 5]

well, after (re)discovering atlantis, locating hercules's tomb, unearthing the pyramid of osiris, visiting the garden of eden, pulling out arthur's sword etc. what do our heroes (still have to) do? [btw if i were these ppl i would choose labours of hercules instead. won't u give these blokes a well deserved break andy?]. locate (sigh! word reuse... hmmm... let it be "open" then) shiva's valut (hey! is the tile not "the sacred vault"? someone had the bright idea that we indians may be sold on the word shiva, hence the tilte "the valut of shiva" in these climes. and the same bright idea generator would have thought shiva doesn't ring the same kind of bell as hercules, arthur or osiris does to the western audience, so the rest of the world has a dull title "the sacred vault".
my only grudge is this: these lead couple discover at the rate of one ancient wonder per year giving a serious dosage of inferiority complex to normal people like me who struggle to find as much as a misplaced key bunch at home.
so coming to the story(?). this time the task is to locate and secure lord shiva's valut (now don't ask me what it contains: if you don't know the answer is along the lines, 'a finding that will alter the course of human future, rewrite human history, and place at the hands of men unimaginable power which at all costs must be protected by a group of dedicated men who somehow manage to maintain a family line of sons who get into the cult for several millennia -- irrespective of a ghengiz khan, timur or alexander steam rolling every living thing once every few centuries...', you are a noob to this genre and you may even like this book!). throw in a james bondish villain who conjures horrybly convoluted (read unworkable devices that give enough time for a iq 40 person to hop away from the intended calamity -- dear dumb-idiot-larger-than-life-villainistas: keep it simple stupid aka. stick to guns/knife/garotte) means to finish off the protagonists and in his free time start world war 3. [why? 'cos he wants to start a new cycle of life -- one that springs from destruction. pray why? lord shiva is the cosmic dancer who is also the destroyer of worlds (no. he's not a cruel god. this is just to get a new cycle started. a very good world premier to the shivite cult indeed!)]. well it's a do-it-yourself thing from now on -- complete the story starting with the one line plot mentioned above.
just wikipedia would do for any technical help. at least dan brown studies city maps extensively so that knowing a narrow alley would mean life for the hero. but andy takes the story to (hitherto) unknown (and unknowable) places. lot of effort spared for him.

another thing these writers fancy is a movie adaptation, and hence a very painful attempt at writing a screenplay instead of a novel. please please write a good story. leave screenplay to your future selves after the book is successful. (even then, you may not be the best person to do so).

and the worst part of writing reviews is... you've to give at least one star. i wish to take a log of it really.

[Mc510 · Rating 1 out of 5]

I like a nice suspend-your-disbelief action book as much as the next guy, but this one is just terrible. It reads like a cross between a Vin Diesel movie and a very, very dumbed-down Dan Brown novel. At least half of the book is blow-by-blow description of preposterous fights, chases, escapes, etc.; after a little bit I just started skimming over these sections. Since you always know that Eddie and Nina will prevail, there's really nothing very interesting reading hundreds of pages of predictable action details. Worst of all, the entire premise of the book -- that Khoil wants to secure the Shiva-Vedas because their secret knowledge will allow him to execute his master plan to end the corrupt civilization -- is rendered hollow when, after Khoil gets the Shiva-Vedas, they are then totally forgotten and he goes on to execute his previously-planned master plan with apparently ever looking at the Shiva-Vedas.

[Paula Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Priceless and precious art is being stolen from around the world. No one claims responsibility. No one seems to know where they are. They just disappear.

Nina and Eddie are present at an exhibit when the Talonor Codex is stolen even though there is heightened security. The Talonor Codex was one of the items our pair found in Atlantis. The Talonor Codex gives clues to the hidden location of the Vault of Shiva. The Indian couple, the Khoils, plan to find the Vault and usher in the end of the current world and bring into being the last one in the Hindi belief.

Packed with adventure and action.

[Athira Gopinath · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you have seen Mission impossible and Indiana Jones, there is nothing much else in this book for you. Of course there are action and racing sequences in a busy road in Frisco and the lonely scenic Himalayan mountains, but you'll soon realize that you're re watching just another flimsy action film. Everything stinks of cliche. but you will tolerate all that through the first 200 something pages just out of curiosity- what exactly is in this Vault of Shiva? And, again, you'll end up sorely disappointed. After all these pages of sheer boredom, it seems that the core contents of the vault of Shiva barely gets a mention!

[Mikaela · Rating 3 out of 5]

If I were to review this book as a stand-alone novel, rather then part of a whole series- I'd have to say I would give it at least four stars.

But as part of a seires... well. Everything just seemn a little repetitive.

1. Everything is happy
2. Evil billionare tries to destroy/take over the world
3. Nina/Eddie somehow get involved
4. World is saved

After 6 books, it's starting to seem a little far fetched. Once or twice, maybe. But SIX TIMES? Come on Eddie and Nina, find a new hobby. Perhaps take up lawn bowls?

[Kit Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was my 6th Andy Mcdermott book and i found the formula getting a bit tired. How many egoistic Billionaire maniacs can there be in the story world? Andy is a very good writer and has created a wonderful series with Wilde/Chase no doubt, but this book could have benefited with more research. The concept is great, the link to Atlantis is clever and some of the characters are stereotypical-yet-good - however the plot is predictable. Such a shame.

[Keith · Rating 5 out of 5]

another fast paced adventure with nina and eddie

[Brenda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another exciting entry in the Nina and Eddie saga. I don't think those two could stay out of trouble if they tried. I can't wait for the next one!!

[Jennifer D]

Huge fan of the Wilde-Chase novels by Andy MCDermott. I realize that all of the books are pretty much the same- just a change of scenery. But I do not care - I love them.

[Jordan Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

As seems to be the case with damn near every McDermott book, The Sacred Vault follows pretty much the exact same formula: Nina and Eddie get wrapped up in some eccentric billionaire's evil plot to take over and/or destroy the world, and in doing so, they come across some ancient tomb, or in this case, vault, that holds the key to defeat the villain and save the day.

For 6 books now, the team has pretty much done the exact same thing, somehow managing to find ancient secrets, destroy a hell of a lot of property and expensive toys, narrowly avoid getting killed multiple times per book, and still come out relatively unscathed. One would think this formulaic writing would quickly get boring and stale (and I would be the first to agree with you), but in his own way, McDermott still has this weird talent to make every new entry into these Wilde/Chase novels exciting and hard to put down.

The Sacred Vault is no different. Yes, it took me nearly 10 days to read (I blame that on work and personal distractions), and yes, it's not exactly the most original kind of story, but I'll wager that so far, after 6 books in this series, McDermott has finally hit his stride and up to this point, Vault is easily the best. Gone are the stupid arguments between Eddie and Nina, and though it always seems to ruin things when favorite characters get married (here's looking at you The Office), deciding to finally make them husband and wife was one of the smartest things McDermott has done for these books. And speaking of smart, McDermott has gone from just a basic action/adventure author to someone who can now join the ranks of the greats like Reilly and Rollins. His scenes of action have grown from 10 page segments to 50 or 60 page epics of explosions and gunshots and races against time. And his descriptions have grown more lengthy and realistic as well. Of course, intelligence readers know this stuff is way outside the spectrum of the real and believable, but who the hell cares? All that matters is having fun and being entertained at the same time, both of which The Sacred Vault easily achieves.

I guess, in all honesty, I would give this book 4.5 stars, being that it's still lacking in originality and is still the same basic fill-in-the-blanks plot structure of all the previous books, but I'm not quite willing to round up to a 5, and since we're still stuck with an archaic rating system here in Goodreads, a solid 4 star rating it will be.

[Jeffrey Lyons · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read several of McDermott's books out of order until I wised up. This is the sixth book, which I read before the first 3 books I believe. But it was on sale somewhere and I figured why not grab it at a discount. And I'm pleased that I did so.

It didn't take long for me to fall in love with Eddie Chase and Nina Wilde. Eddie, the wise-cracking, sarcastic,"oy" former Brit SAS agent/bodyguard for the luscious, red-haired yet headstrong archaeologist Nina Wilde. Since I read this in 2011, I have read all of the Wilde-Chase books that I can get my hands on. And mostly i order.

Kind of a blah start with a social event that quickly turns into Eddie chasing a bunch of bad guys who crashed the party. And it rarely lets up from there. Here are some adjectives to define this and most of the Wilde-Chase books. Breathless, action-packed, sensational, unlikely, thrill-ride, and plenty of LOL.

I think fans of James Rollins and Clive Cussler could get into the Andy McDermott books. There is often an ancient secret that has somehow reared its ugly head into the present and Nina/Eddie are there to find the thing in a 'bang 'em up,' 'shoot 'em up' fashion. One of the ongoing jokes in this series is how Nina wants to preserve the archaeological site while Eddie is satisfied to to blow it up to save their tushes.

I am always on the lookout for new Andy McDermott books.

[Matthew Shearer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Big on adventure. Big on explosion. Just Big. Eddie and Nina are back on another globe-trotting adventure to save the world from an evil megalomaniac bent on reshaping the world to their own warped vision. McDermott gives our heroes some new challenges to overcome this time around, such as Eddie having to go all Tom Cruise and brake into his own place of employment to steal an artifact so that he can trade it to the villains for Nina. Shenanigans ensue, obstacles are overcome (or destroyed), treasures are found. What more could you ask for? I, for one, love the over-the-top storytelling that Mr. McDermott keeps putting out, and cannot wait to jump into the next nonstop, big bang adventure.

[Steven Leitman · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my last one, I had trouble reading this and the motivation just wasn't there. It is the same formulae over and over and over ad nauseam. The originality is gone and for crying out loud there is absolutely no sense that archaeology actually plays a role here. the only thing this one had going for it was that all the character they've met and some nasty nasty villains were here as well.

[Malcolm Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

At one level, this book is really not much different to the others in the series. But I don't care about that because it's chock full of high-octane explosive set pieces, chases and scenes. There is a story in here somewhere, but it's about as trivial as the lore you're meant to read while queuing for a roller coaster. I'm just here for the ride, and it did not disappoint. Love the main characters and their relationship.

[Joe Geesin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another brilliant story in the series, this one following on nicely from the previous story. Again, chasing after relics and a battle with a megalomanic.

Overall it's a good and gripping read, and it does make you want to continue the series. Although some of the high tension scenes, the mountain climb for example, go on for a little too long in what is a longer book than normal. A little respite here and there would be no bad thing.

Looking forward to the next one.

[Thomas McGuire · Rating 5 out of 5]

Danger Around Every Corner

Nina, Eddie, Mac and Ken take on a mentally deranged computer nerd and his wife in a race to find an Indian gods hidden treasure. The book is hard to put down. There is excitement and danger on every turn of the page.

Andy McDermott is one of the most versatile story tellers . I’ve read most of his books and enjoyed them all.

[Tressa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did not finish listening to The Sacred Vault. I’ve also decided not to continue with the series. I thought Nina would be more suspicious during the taxi scene. I know that she had a lot on her mind, but I expected better from her because of the prior books.

[Jayal · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're looking for a serious literary experience, you're knocking on the wrong door. But y'know, sometimes in life, you just need high adrenaline car chases, impossible escapades and a lot of blood in a lot of innovative ways.
And for those times, this book works like a charm.

[Véronique]

Why did Chase have to steal the codex in the first place? As if he couldn’t have worked out a deal with the IHA... And then the stealing had to be described in the smallest details. So boring and so unnecessary. I gave up!