Jack DuBrul, Havoc

Havoc

Jack DuBrul

Dutton, October 2006, $24.95

ISBN: 0525948821

In 1937, Chester Bowie makes a startling discovery about how Alexander the Great conquered the world. He realizes the emperor had a weapon of mass destruction millennia before anyone heard of nuclear energy. However, on his trip from Europe to the United States to further his work, Chester dies on that fatal Hindenburg disaster, but he leaves clues about his discovery.

In the present, in the midst of the civil war that has caused death and destruction to the Central African Republic, Geologist Philip Mercer mourns the death of his girlfriend. That is until he finds marooned CDC researcher nuclear energy expert Cali Stowe stranded in the middle of nowhere. She was on her way to the remote village of Kivu, where apparently some unknown cause is deforming and killing newborns. He takes her to the village where she begins testing, but Guerrillas arrive and take the pair prisoner. However, warriors come out of nowhere to kill the Guerrillas, but European mercenary Poli escapes. As the couple flees to DC to follow clues left by Bowie, Poli comes after them.

The plot may be implausible, but it sure is fun, as the action never slows down whether it is 1937, the present, in Africa or the United States. Philip (see HARON'S LANDING) seems a bit shallow, as he goes in a nanosecond from grief to desire, but no one will care, as the adventures and escapes never stop. Thriller fans will enjoy Jack DuBrul's HAVOC.