Impact

by Douglas Preston

Overview

In Douglas Preston's 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.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250841476
Publisher:	Tor Publishing Group
Publication date:	12/28/2010
Series:	Wyman Ford Series , #3
Pages:	368
Sales rank:	370,933
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.96(d)

About the Author

Douglas Preston is the co-author with Lincoln Child of the celebrated Pendergast series of novels, including such best-selling titles as Fever Dream, The Book of the Dead, The Wheel of Darkness, and Relic, which became a number one box office hit movie. His solo novels include the New York Times bestsellers Blasphemy, The Codex, and Tyrannosaur Canyon. His nonfiction books include The Monster of Florence. Preston is an expert long-distance horseman, a member of the elite Long Riders Guild, and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. He has travelled to remote parts of the world as an archaeological correspondent for The New Yorker. He also worked as an editor and writer at the American Museum of Natural History in New York and taught nonfiction writing at Princeton University. Preston is the Co-president of International Thriller Writers, and serves on the Governing Council of the Authors Guild.

Place of Birth:

Cambridge, Massachusetts

Education:

B.A., Pomona College, 1978

Website:

http://www.prestonchild.com

Editorial Reviews

Some hopeful science fiction fans such as yours truly have begun to see Preston as the possible successor to the recently deceased Michael Crichton… Some novels you want to savor, some you want to read so quickly that you can scarcely keep yourself from tearing pages as you move forward. Preston's entertaining accomplishments tend toward the latter.” —Alan Cheuse, National Public Radio

“Impact is out of this world. Simply put, Douglas Preston has crossed over into a new frontier of thriller. It is a fireball of astronomic proportion that will leave you gasping for air! So buckle up, turn off the phone, and don't forget to breathe.” —Brad Thor, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Apostle

“Douglas Preston's wildly creative novels expertly blend real science and heart-stopping thrills. He is, quite simply, the new and improved Michael Crichton.” —Tess Gerritsen, New York Times bestselling author of The Keepsake

“A brilliantly executed thriller-exciting, fascinating, and thought-provoking. The kind of book you want to savor-and when dawn comes you realize that it has taken off like a rocket and swept you through the night. Wild and wonderful reading fun! A highly original and yet eerily plausible premise.” —Whitley Strieber, New York Times bestselling author of Critical Mass

“Brilliant . . . full of huge ideas, but intensely human, too, and intensely suspenseful.” —Lee Child, New York Times bestselling author of the Jack Reacher novels

“Preston will have his readers checking the sky for falling objects. Impact delivers one . . . and then some!” —Sandra Brown, New York Times bestselling author of Smash Cut: A Novel

“One of our best writers and entertainers is back, so make sure that your seat belts are securely fastened and your tray tables are stowed, because-no surprise-Douglas Preston pulls it off yet again: another fast-paced, action-packed, mind-bending adventure. You'll be sorry when the flight is over and your imagination returns you to the real world.” —William Martin, New York Times bestselling author of The Lost Constitution

From the Publisher

Near the start of this solid thriller from bestseller Preston, the U.S. president's science adviser asks former CIA operative Wyman Ford, last seen in 2008's Blasphemy, to look into the sudden appearance of radioactive gemstones, in particular to identify the precise location of their origin in Cambodia. Meanwhile, college dropout and frustrated astronomer Abbey Straw, who believes she witnessed a meteor's fall, embarks on a search of small islands near her Maine home to locate pieces of the meteorite to sell on eBay. In California, soon-to-be murdered professor Jason Freeman sends Mark Corso, a Mars mission technician at the National Propulsion Facility, a classified hard drive with evidence of gamma rays emanating from the red planet. The three story lines end up neatly intersecting, though the final payoff doesn't do justice to the engaging setup. Preston refrains from inserting the scientific minilectures of which the late Michael Crichton was so fond. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

Wyman Ford, hero of Tyrannosaur Canyon and Blasphemy, returns in Preston's latest thriller, where the stakes involve not only the salvation of the world but also the solar system. A young woman in Maine sees a meteorite streak through the sky and decides to find the crater. A scientist working on Mars data finds something so startling that he is murdered to keep the information secret. And Ford heads to Cambodia to investigate the source of a new gemstone on the market that has radioactive properties. When he arrives, he realizes that the mine is an exit hole. How can a meteorite travel through the earth? VERDICT Preston has done it again. The thriller elements mix well with the science aspects of the story, and the author makes even the hard-to-grasp concepts easy to understand. Most readers will consume this in one sitting; not to be missed.—Jeff Ayers, Seattle P.L.

Library Journal

Douglas Preston pulls out all the stops in this thriller. While the characters and situations are stock science fiction—involving strange natural phenomena appearing all over the Solar System—Preston packages them in a plot intricate and timely enough to keep the listener engaged. Scott Sowers demonstrates the proficiency that has earned him a reputation as an accomplished narrator. His skillful use of volume and pace delivers intensity and drama while keeping the scene and character transitions clear and easy to follow. Minor flaws in this strong performance that will grate on the Downeast ear are his inability to accurately duplicate the region's accent and the repeated mispronunciation of a prominent location in the story, Damariscotta, Maine. Overall, however, Preston and Sowers fans will find much to enjoy. M.O.B. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2010 - AudioFile