Customer Reviews

Atlantis 1

5 star:		(57)
4 star:		(26)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

This is an excellent book by Greg Donegan. I picked it up simply because it presented an interesting twist to the age-old "Atlantis" and "Bermuda Triangle" mysteries. The author weaves an intricate web of adventure and mayhem entangled with very believable sci-fi. From start to finish there is an incredible pace to the book. The main plot is very intriguing and it is really hard to put the book down. Simply because of the unique nature of the plot and the good finish it is a MUST READ! The only thing that begs a question is, "When is the sequel coming out?"

Is there an alien connection with the lost city of Atlantis? How does the ancient city in Cambodia of Angkor Kel fit in? This exciting novel penned by the author of many names(Bob Mayer aka Greg Donegan here!) is the start of a new series and attempts to answer these questions, among many more about the world's mysteries. In the story, which begins with aircraft disappearing in the Bermuda Triangle in 1945 and then a strange alien encounter with a special forces unit despatched to Angkor Kel to recover a crashed reconnaissance aircraft occurs during the Vietnam war. Move forward to the present. Another plane, a privately-owned geological survey jet, crashes in the same spot. As communications are blacked out by strange signals, a special forces unit led by Eric Dane, survivor of the Vietnam encounter is sent there by the President. Not only that, signals are being bounced off satellites all round the globe which arer believed to be too advanced for human technology! Military action buffs and sci-fi fans will love this introductory novel to a new series, and to those who gave it one star, give it a chance. The prose is easy reading, the narrative fast-paced and the technologies are explained in the least amount of detail so as anybody can understand, which in this type of novel is fine. And this comes highly recommended.

Ok, appears a lot of people are fans of the author(s) and series. I'm a newbie, and this will be my last. First 2/3 of the book was a good 3.5 stars, despite the fact that the author could never really present a good tangible description of the 'others'. Then wow, the last bit of the book was fractured, disjointed, called for something beyond a suspension of disbelief, and it almost seemed like it was in a hurry to end itself. Very disappointing.

Here I am, 2/3 of the way through this book, and the story is just starting to maybe get off the ground... Maybe! I can' t wait anymore for it to finally get going! I'm pulling my hair out and my mind is starting to daydream as I read! Most good books I've read have a setup of the story and then you're off! At this point in the book, I'm begging the characters to get moving and get on with it. This is NOT suspense, it's utter frustration!

I've read many of Bob Mayer's books before and enjoyed them. I am half way through the Gate series and it's a good read BUT the proof reading is non-existent and it effects the readability of the text greatly in some places. I don't know if it's Mr. mayer's, fault or Amazon's bit it's not acceptable. It's so bad on occasions that it takes 3-4 read throughs to understand what's actually being written. I don't care that this is an ebook format, no-one paying for a book should have to accept that poor level of quality. You certainly wouldn't with a printed copy. Proof read before publishing please!

This is my first review for a Kindle ebook....I always read customer reviews in order to help me make my decisions. I hope this review is helpful. I enjoy all genres of literature and have been on a bit of a scifi kick. This novel had potential to be very interesting and suspenseful, but sadly fell quite short. It left many unanswered questions and lacked much detail in character depth/detail and plot. When I finished the novel, I was left wondering...will there be a sequel? If so, will it answer the questions that the original did not? In my opinion, Atlantis left the reader asking..."Who", "What" and "Why"?

My biggest complaint, and this applies to this book in particular, in addition to works by other authors, is: if you're going to write "military science fiction," get the military details correct! Personally, I find it very distracting to the story when the details are incorrect.

I think that most readers of military science fiction have some knowledge about weapons, etc. That's what makes this genre appeal to them. So, if you're going to have the characters using a very well-known weapon like the M-60, don't state that it's capable of firing "six thousand rounds per second," when its actual rate of fire is 500-600 rounds per minute. Don't have F-16 fighters (a USAF aircraft) flying from aircraft carriers (another of this author's books -- "Area 51").

Do a little basic research into what you're writing about, so as no to distract the reader from the overall story.

I read the sequel first, but whoever thinks this a disadvantage is wrong. Unlike other authors (or editors!) Greg Donegan presents us with a round story that is fully completed and does not necessarily need a sequel. But both books are very good. This one is a trifle better even than the "Bermuda Triangle". What I think very good is that the author does not make the same mistake as many modern SF authors: he does not indulge in painfully long descriptions of technical devices that do not exist, but writes a story for the story's sake. And it is a story full of suspense with characters that are credible and alive. In this book the fantasy elements are missing that give such a decisive character to the second book. But here the characters and a well constructed plot take over and make this novel a unique experience. I am waiting for number three now and I am certain that it will be as good as the first two.

I read this book in one night, I just couldn't put it down. Donegan put quite a twist on the whole "Atlantis" and "Bermuda Triangle" deal. But, what got me was the "special gift" that the lead character, Dane had. That was awesome. This is one of my all time favorite books by him, along with the Area 51 series(which was written under a different pen name, Robert Doherty). The only thing that I didn't like about the book was that it was too damn short. I can't wait for the sequel to come out.

Overall it was good read. Fast paced adventure story. Lots of fun. But technical gaffes were more than a little distracting. Authors attempt to explain a lot of the technology in the story and they clearly don't understand it. Two glaring issues that I found very distracting were GPS technology and satellite orbital mechanics. Bad guys used signal to GPS satellite to hide stuff, but GPS satellites don't receive any signals from users, they only broadcast. There were other errors in description of how GPS works, but that was the worst. On the orbital mechanics issue, the book has a spy satellite at 150 mile altitude stop over a spot on the Earth, which violates some laws of physics. Then it has the satellite do something at least as impossible later on. If I didn't have a basic understanding of physics I could have probably ignored these and just gotten into the fun of the storytelling, but authors made too big a point of trying to explain these things.