Fortunately, a NUMA (National Underwater and Marine Agency) geological surveying vessel Deep Encounter is nearby, and Dirk Pitt, special projects director, he of the opaline eyes and the snappy quip, is on board. He observes the bright glow on the horizon and alerts others to the emergency. The Deep Encounter speeds to the rescue.

Dr. Egan and Kelly prepare to abandon ship, but two mysterious men appear and struggle with Dr. Egan for the leather case he carries. Father and daughter fall overboard. Critically injured, Dr. Egan pushes Kelly to take the case.

Eventually most of the ship passengers are rescued. One of the mysterious men reappears on the Deep Encounter and attempts to murder Kelly only to be interrupted by Pitt. The late Dr. Egan’s work seems to be the focus of the repeated villainy. When Kelly and Pitt investigate the leather case, they find it empty.

Later, three members of the crew of the Deep Encounter, including Pitt and his friend and colleague Al Giordino, dive in a submersible to inspect the wreck of the Emerald Dolphin. They determine conclusively that the disaster was not accidental. When they return to the ocean surface, they find the Deep Encounter and its entire crew have disappeared. They are alone in the vast Pacific.

Eventually Pitt and his NUMA colleagues will determine that the powerful energy conglomerate Cerberus, headed by its evil CEO, is determined to destroy the secretive Dr. Egan’s work. Together Pitt and Kelly will try to discover his hidden lab.

This is the sixteenth Dirk Pitt adventure. It follows the formula of its predecessors: the intrepid hero surmounts every challenge and survives to face still others. There is no life-threatening crisis too enormous for Pitt’s abilities. He does sometimes seem to be surrounded by a bunch incompetents because he is nearly always the one who figures out the solution to a seemingly hopeless predicament. There’s a reasonable question whether some of the derring-do requires a physical prowess beyond the capability of the now middle-aged hero, and his smartalecky wisecracks get tedious after a while, but it’s a formula that obviously works because this most recent installment in the Dirk Pitt series is on the best seller lists.

Valhalla Rising features serial episodes of action, action, and more action with fewer romantic interludes than some earlier books. The solitary Pitt at last comes to the realization that he’s not cut out for wedded life. Kelly seems to be a good match for him - rescued by Pitt after enduring torture at the hands of the bad guys, she goes out to the kitchen and fixes dinner! - but no romance between the two develops. He does, however, occasionally need to enlist the assistance of others. Clive Cussler, the author himself, who is on a world cruise in his catamaran, lends a hand in the rescue of the Deep Encounter crew from certain death.

Ordinarily reviews only cover incidents in the early portions of a book, but there is one unfortunate plot twist near the end of Valhalla Rising that deserves mention. The story is set two years in the future in 2003. The final diabolic scheme of Cerberus and its morally impaired cohorts is to ram a super-tanker loaded with propane gas into the Manhattan shoreline between the twin towers of the World Trade Center. But not to worry: Dirk Pitt is on hand to thwart their evil intentions.

If only.

Sometimes fiction pales next to reality.

--Lesley Dunlap