The Ark - Book Review

When creating angles of both biblical and archeological prospects in an adventure novel, it is good to stay within certain realms of technological structure. Believability is a key issue. The other of course is character. "The Ark" [Boyd Morrison/Touchstone/432 pgs] straddles the elements of both while maintaining a necessity of pacing and fun. While similarities and love interests do maintain comparisons to other adventure novels (Dirk Pitt comes to mind), the humor and personification of Tyler & Grant, two wild and crazy guys with alot of money and intelligence at their fingertips, plays well in the general personification of a serial-type story. The Bond-esque element is, of course, overblown at times and the writer's fascination as would-be with a hark to movie one-liners is understood and adequate to the story. The essence of a biblical structure as indicated before always maintains pause for a story because of the tendency to be melodramatic. However, on the other hand, this structure creates a universal guideline since more than half the world has read the Old Testament and the story of Noah. The analogies are sound which makes for excellent reading. Relationship issues such as the death of Tyler's wife and his attraction to Dilara are formulaic and precipitated but again passable. The overarching impact of "The Ark" is that it is a cool, swift adventure story which is like many before it, no better than some but superlative to others. The author creates a good ground upon which to build a franchise, especially with the background of Tyler as an accident investigation specialist which opens the door to a host of other possible adventures. In terms of specifics within the novel, one of the most effective plot devices involves a disease agent which makes reference to the plague but one that is enhanced by man. This motivates and sets up the element of a "ghost plane" and what causes its crash. It is this occurrence that anchors the entire book allowing a didactic dissection of fame versus belief which is not lost on some of the similarities to a current fringe religion popular in certain circles. "The Ark" skews some of these ideas but not so much that it loses the ideal of its primary action: to entertain. Out of 5, I give it a 2 1/2.