Steve Manke
Written on Feb 23, 2010
Jump ahead ten millennia and an archeological dig in the frozen tundra of Canada uncovers a perfectly preserved mammoth buried in the ice. An experienced team is assembled to recover the valuable specimen. But without a proper team leader the expedition is already in peril. The entrepreneur financing the mammoth recovery reluctantly agrees to bring on an old acquaintance to lead the expedition. But the teams would be leader is reluctant to join the expedition, still traumatized after a failed archeological recovery that ended in disaster years earlier.
As the team leader struggles with his haunted past, he is reunited with a crew he has not seen in years. The reunion is bitter sweet in many ways as the team moves north with a dizzying array of equipment that should allow them to recover the priceless mammoth from the ice.
But the dig uncovers more than anticipated with the mammoth body. And with this discovery, the dig faces dangers that no one could have anticipated. As the team struggles to come to grips with the true nature of their discovery, it is set upon by a small band of Inuit people who seem less than honest about their concern for the dig.
The story unfolds in a fast paced series of action charged sequences that explains the history of the characters involved as they struggle to survive and escape the fate of the ancient Inuit woman from the stories open. As the story moves on, the reader becomes increasingly pulled into the story as the characters grow in breadth and become more and more compelling.
This novel is as compelling as it is action packed. A work of science fiction that is engaging and captivating. And in typical Robinson fashion, it builds to a climax that alters the readers understanding of history as a whole. The secrets of the Canadian wasteland turn out to be much more far reaching than expected.