Thursday, October 29, 2009

Book Review: Ice Station by Matthew Reilly

Action all the way!

This thriller novel is full of non-stop violent action. By page 100, I was out of breath just from reading the book, and I don't know how the characters kept up the pace without tiring. And that is the trend through all 689 pages of my copy of the book. That said, I know it is fiction and things can get a bit far-fetched sometimes, but it still makes for an enjoyable reading experience, since the pages just keep on turning automatically. One of my first thoughts before hitting page 100 was that this author might be writing with a movie in mind, so vividly were the action scenes described.

The premise of the story is that US Scientists at a remote Antarctic ice station find a strange and fascinating large metallic object buried deep under the ice for millions of years. This object seems to be of military value and a first-class team of US marines, led by the accomplished protagonist, Lt. Shane Schofield a.k.a. Scarecrow, is sent to Antarctica to secure the object. And this is where the action starts - other countries also show an intense interest in this object and everyone is literally prepared to fight to the death for it. There are also plenty of suspense and near-death escapes in this novel to satisfy any lover of action-packed thrillers.

However, I have a few problems with this book; one being the fact that NATO allies, such as the British, the French and the US fight tooth and nail over this object, without any plausible reason supplied why they would want to fight their allies. Another problem is that there was an incident where two guys jumped into the ocean, and after some fighting with the enemy in the water, they land up on a large iceberg drifting in the ocean - and this iceberg just happens to have something buried under the snow and ice that would help them further on in the story - a large coincidence. But then again, like I have mentioned earlier, this is fiction, and if it keeps the pages turning, who cares?

Monday, October 5, 2009

Film Rights: Strike of the Black Mamba

A while ago, I was approached by a South African film company regarding the film rights of my thriller novel Strike of the Black Mamba. They said it was only an enquiry, and so I did not put too much hope in it.

Seeing that they have not contacted me again, I'm sure that it's not going to happen (this time).

Feeling that the book will make a great action-packed, suspenseful thriller movie (I'm the author, I should know - ;-)  -no I'm only joking - but a few people have actually mentioned this to me), I would like to appeal to all hollywood (or other) filmmakers, movie directors or scriptwriters to take a look at the novel.

Well, one can only but hope!