If you love diving and you enjoy reading exciting books, you’re going to find that The Deep Zone by James M. Tabor, author of Blind Descent, is just what the doctor ordered.
While pacing and a great story are two requirements for a great thriller, the best stories are those that convince readers to suspend reality for a while and really get involved with what’s happening on those pages. In The Deep Zone, Tabor creates well-rounded characters that are so vivid that readers get the feeling they know these people personally.
Best of all, Tabor hooks his readers from the first few sentences, fashioning a chilling yet completely believable plot from the outset. Here’s an excerpt from the first paragraph:
Some nights, when the winds of spring rise up out of Virginia, they peel fog from the Potomac and drape it over the branches of dead trees trapped in the river’s black mud banks. Streamers pull free and flow into the mews of Foggy Bottom and the cobblestoned alleys of Old Georgetown, float over the chockablock townhouses, and finally wrap pale, wet shrouds around war-fortune mansions.
The scene is poetically set for excitement, and readers rapidly find themselves completely engrossed in a tale that tells of a deadly, highly contagious, and antibiotic-resistant new bacterium that has been discovered in Afghanistan and which has made its way stateside before anyone really knows what’s happening. To prevent a widespread pandemic, a team of elite divers led by Hallie Leland, an experienced cave diver and spelunker, must make their way deep into a spooky supercave to retrieve a fungus-like substance called moonmilk that can be used to manufacture an antibiotic to halt the bacterium.
Matters quickly become complicated for Hallie Leland and her team. Cueva de Luz is located in a region of Mexico that is controlled by drug smugglers, plus influential government pawns working for a powerful pharmaceutical firm want the team to fail, and they’re not above using homicide to accomplish their goals.
A complicated tale of intrigue that could become less than believable in the hands of an unskilled writer, The Deep Zone is a book you’ll find difficult to put down. The breadth of the epidemic’s spread is mind-blowing, as is the extent to which the conspirators go to prevent Hallie Leland and her team from achieving their dangerous mission.
James Tabor’s writing style has been compared to that of the late, great Michael Crichton, and that is definitely accurate since Tabor executes the same skill Crichton did in blending science fiction with science fact to create a believable and completely chilling story that will have you holding your breath until the novel comes to an end.
While much of the novel’s action takes place topside, be advised that there’s a cave diving sequence that will have you thinking twice about ever venturing into a deep cave – at least until the book comes to its conclusion! If you’re looking for a great read that will stimulate your sense of adventure and your intellect alike, James M. Tabor’s The Deep Zone is certain to satisfy.