Over the years, I’ve read a lot of Clive Cussler’s novels, mainly because they’re exciting and they convey the author’s love of the sea and history. Nearly all the Cussler books I’ve read were within his Dirk Pitt series.
I just finished listening to Lost Empire, which Cussler wrote with Grant Blackwood. The audiobook was a product of Recorded Books, LLC and was narrated by Scott Brick. This book involves a different set of protagonists. Sam and Remi Fargo (nice pun–“far go”) are a wealthy, young married couple who enjoy treasure-hunting. While scuba-diving in Tanzania, they discover a ship’s bell that gets the adventure going.
First the good points. Remi is a strong female character–something missing from the Dirk Pitt novels. Sam ends up dealing with most of the physical rough stuff, but Remi is no slouch. The story is a rollicking adventure along the lines of most of Cussler’s works. The tensions build nicely and the chapters are short, making for easy reading. I haven’t done any fact checking to see how plausible the historical aspects of the plot were, but I didn’t detect any real howlers as I was listening to the book during my commute. Scott Brick did a great job with the narration, providing authentic-sounding and consistent accents to the various characters.
However, the character physical descriptions are sparse and I didn’t get a great feel for the character’s inner selves. In fact, there were times when I wasn’t sure whose point of view I was seeing the world from. It seemed as if parts of the book were written rapidly; here’s an actual sentence from the book: “I agree,” Sam agreed. What’s wrong with ‘said?’ As with many of Cussler’s books, a character with the actual name ‘Clive Cussler’ makes an appearance and assists the heroes at one of their most desperate moments. As a best-selling author, Mr. Cussler has earned the right to employ such deux ex machina devices, I suppose, but any such manuscripts from me would be rejected amidst gales of laughter. Lastly, Cussler is starting to re-use concepts from earlier books; I seem to recall that his novel Treasure also involved a manic trying to create a modern version of the Aztec Empire.
You know my book rating system by now. I give Lost Empire two seahorses. If you enjoyed Mr. Cussler’s other books, or love easy-to-read adventure novels, then this book will pass the time effectively. Otherwise, well, there are reasons some empires should become lost. I could be wrong, though, and in that case you should leave a comment for–
Poseidon’s Scribe
