| GOLIATH REVIEW by Garrett Peck Reprinted from Gauntlet Regular readers of this column will remember the praise lavished on last year s Steve Alten release, Domain. His maturation into one of our finest popular novelists continues apace with Goliath. In the year 2008, a new generation of stealth submarine has been built. Known as Goliath, the submarine resembles a devil ray and its mini-subs resemble hammerhead sharks. It s shape and five jet propulsors make it virtually undetectable underwater. Unlike any other vessel on the open seas, Goliath is run by a bio-chemical computer called Sorceress, a revolutionary prototype of artificial intelligence. Begun as a top secret government project, Goliath was cancelled when the schematics were destroyed, but not before Covah passed them on to China. When Goliath is built, Covah commandeers it with a handpicked crew whom, like himself, have been victims of repressive governments. Covah attacks the American fleet, sinking the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan and stealing its nuclear missiles. Covah and his crew intend to put an end to tyrannical governments and force humanity to disarm, or they ll start wiping cities off the map. As nuclear missiles are launched and the world is being forced to accede to Covah s demands, Sorceress becomes self-aware and proceeds with its own agenda. The best way to stop human violence, it decides, is to rid the world of humanity. It has the will and means to do it and isn t listening to its captain anymore. As he demonstrated in his earlier books, Alten is a master at mixing genre elements to create stories that work on multiple levels. Goliath provides the most exciting submarine battles since The Hunt for Red October, the most believable nuclear apocalypse scenario since Fail Safe and the most horrifying glimpse of artificial intelligence since 2001: A Space Odyssey. Simon Covah is the finest villain I ve encountered in years. This multi-layered character is as sympathetic as he is frightening. Covah s appearance is hideous, due to his having been burned nearly to death by Serbs in Kosovo that killed his family. The temporal section of his skull was replaced with a steel plate that he refused to have covered with skin grafts. His monstrous looks and willingness to kill millions to achieve his goals are juxtaposed against his sincere desire to bring a lasting peace to humanity. Alten contrasts Covah with his hero Gunnar Wolfe, a designer of Goliath wrongfully imprisoned by the government for Covah s crime, and his heroine, Commander Rochelle "Rocky" Jackson, Gunnar s former fiancée. Alten combines fast-paced action with deep research and thoughtful moral dilemmas into a novel that entertains, educates, horrifies and inspires deep thought. You couldn t ask for more from popular fiction of any kind. Alten already has me waiting for the next installments in his other series (Resurrection in the Domain series and Primal Waters in the Meg series), now he s got me waiting for the next book in this new one, to be called Sorceress. The only thing more suspenseful than reading a Steve Alten novel is anticipating the next one. |