Customer Reviews

Cryptozoica

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I just finished reading Cryptozoica a few minutes ago and had to drop a few lines in here about it. The short version is if you are a fan of Indiana Jones, Action-Adventure, Robert E. Howard, and were sadly disappointed by Dan Brown's latest non-adventure then this is the book you want to turn to. This is the book that delivers with heroes that some would say are larger then life (I say some just live interesting lives!), Dinosaurs, and lost civilizations. This is Zacharia Sitchen and David Hatcher Childress in novelized form.

Cryptozoica draws you in from the beginning with plot build up and interesting, if zanny, characterization of a group of down on their luck misfits mixed in with descriptions of a secret society, a suppressed part of Charles Darwin's journal, and a lost island in the south china sea. You get introduced to the pulp down and out hero who has turned the booze, the wild child with switch blades, the triad princess, a paleontologist, a evil dwarf, and a black dynamite style ex-Navy SEAL. I was not expecting such a large build up in the beginning of the book however the writing was strong throughout and I never lost interest so I won't detract any stars here, just expected something else by making the mistake of judging a book by its cover!

I won't give away any of the plot points Mark Ellis carefully crafted out but it was great to see him combine dozens of subjects I've always been interested in and throw them together in this novel. The descriptions of the natural environments were great, very visual and the action clear and concise, also cool to see some lesser known Dino's in the book.

Of course something needs to be said about the illustrations in Cryptozoica as well. Jeff Slemons did a outstanding job with the cover and interior artwork. Just the right style, the characters look great and the dinosaurs look pretty anatomically correct as well as the intended sense of motion looking very fluid. On a side note I also thought the placement of the pictures themselves was very well thought out in relation to the text of the chapter that described them.

In the entertainment industry I think corporate committees have pretty much rendered most fiction generic and boring but Cryptozoica is a refreshing change, probably because its self published so you get the real deal from the author rather then something watered down. Alright, now lets see a sequel...

Jack Murphy

Author of "Reflexive Fire"

I finally finished reading the creator of Outlanders first independent novel Cryptozoica. This novel had all of Mark's trademarks... beautiful, intelligent women - even if one was nothing more than the classic dragon lady, stalwart companions, rough and ready albeit flawed heroes and scheming dastardly bad guys.

And of course exotic locations, ancient mysteries as well as monsters - well at least in this case, dinosaurs.

Unlike other books that deal with dinosaurs set in the modern era, the concepts that the author wrote about, if the reader takes the time to do a little research of their own, will find that they are sound and rooted in actual science, nothing that was simply made up on the spot, or as it is otherwise known science fantasy.

Without really giving away much of the plot, the novel isn't set strictly on the isle of dinosaurs, that is only a small part of it. The novel deals with the background story of the island that goes back to the Victorian era, and further.

If anything, the novel is heavily character driven. Unlike some franchises that I can mention, the characters don't take a back seat to the Dinosaurs, but are fully realized and given complex personalities and backgrounds, of which there is still plenty that can be written on them and expanded upon in the (I hope) inevitable sequel(s).

Also, unlike other franchises, the dinosaurs don't represent the only danger to the protagonists of this rousing adventure.

Simply put, if you want a rousing classic style adventure that pits the heroes against man and nature and that deals with what could be science fact and not simply fiction, then I would strongly recommend that you pick up this novel and give it a read.

I can't write the review without talking about the interior artwork. There are at least a dozen full page panels of art throughout the book, not including the character sketches in the very beginning. The art is reminiscent of the classic pulp style art found throughout the 70's and 80' adventure style comics and is right at home here. Kudos to Jeff Slemons for his contribution to this work!

5 out of 5

A perennial hot button issue in science and religion is on the origin of life. Were humans created by God--in which case, whose God?--or by evolution or by something else entirely? In "Cryptozoica," Mark Ellis adds fuel to the fire by offering another theory on the origin of man that involves dinosaurs and some very special goo.

Like "The Da Vinci Code," the story also involves secret societies. In this case it's the School of Night, an ultra-secret club of scholars that included Charles Darwin himself. In the book's prologue, we learn that Darwin and the crew of the Beagle ran across the Tamtung islands, which were home to some very weird creatures. They didn't really know what to call them since the word "dinosaur" hadn't been invented yet.

Skip forward to the present. "Tombstone" Jack Kavanaugh is living on Little Tamtung along with his friend Crowe. They, along with an eccentric billionaire, tried to start a sort of Jurassic Park/dinosaur safari on Big Tamtung, but the venture was shut down after three people died. Now the School of Night is getting involved, along with some Asian gangsters who helped bankroll the original venture. This means that Jack, Crowe, and some new and old friends all have to return to Big Tamtung and unlock its secrets.

What secrets are those? You'll just have to read to find out.

"Cryptozoica" is a taut and engaging pulp adventure. If I have one complaint, it's that there wasn't enough of a body count. I wanted the dinos to munch a few more people. Still, this is a fun, exciting read with some great illustrations too that should bring to mind old school adventure stories like "The Lost World" while adding a little modern science and conspiracy theory to the mix to freshen it up.

That is all.

In this book, Mr. Ellis will escort you, quite vividly, on a south sea adventure crawling with all kinds of nasties - human and otherwise. This tour-de-force rekindled the great times I had as a kid watching "Creature-Double-Feature" - the Saturday afternoon Monster flick extravaganzas which had you laughing and shaking (but not at the same time). Get it all here in Cryptozoica with plenty of hard-core action and just the right touch of some nice twists and turns topped with a grand finale that would even impress Howard Philips Lovecraft himself! I didn't want it to end. The artwork is awesome and so complimentary that I'd find myself fighting back the urge to peek ahead to the next one! They are placed so adeptly in the text...stunning!

Adventure done right

Mark Ellis is a prolific writer, well known for the stories written as James Axler (including the popular Outlanders series) as for those written under his own name. A firm grip on the adventure aspect of storytelling is his forte, and Cryptozoica is a fine example of this. This is an adventure done right. I can easily see it rolling onto the big screen as naturally as a newborn coming out of a womb, already perfect, with hardly a change necessary. Somehow, Mark has managed to marry the Hollywood approach to filmmaking (Indiana Jones crossed with Jurassic Park), that typically makes for much excitement but often falls short for the more sophisticated viewer, with the best traditions of the written genre, capable of pleasing the brainiac science fiction readership. The baby has the best of both. What's more, a lover of Dan Brown may even throw the parentage into question, claiming that the baby clearly must be a product of secret societies at work--and (s)he'd be right!

Cryptozoica also marks a debut of the Mark & Melissa husband-and-wife team as a small press publisher. This shows in the plethora of small but welcome modifications of the standard book layout. The very first pages contain the portraits of the unlikely crew to brave the Island of Big Tamtung--as all other illustrations in the book (including the cute dinosaurs figures next to the page numbers), drawn by Jeff Slemons. The artist has done a great job. The images are eloquent representations of the characters. Interestingly, "Tombstone" Jack Cavanagh bears some resemblance, in my biased opinion, to the author himself. He, along with Augustus Crowe and a teenage Maori girl Mouzi, make the "two captains and one crew member" team of the Cryptozoica Enterprizes: two former members of the U.S. Air Force and Navy respectively, and an ex-pirate girl who doesn't shy away from cutting a man's throat.

Jack's helicopter and Gus's boat are about the only things remaining of the Cryptozoica Enterprizes, their failed attempt to make money out of their discovery of an island in the Pacific teaming with surviving dinosaurs. Joining them is an unlikely trio of a dwarfish scientist, Aubrey Belleau, led to the island by a suppressed portion of Charles Darwin's diary (suppressed, of course, by his secret society), his enormous bodyguard Oakeshott, a black belt who fights dirty in the to-the-death arenas in Bangkok, and Honore Roxton, a woman paleontologist with the handicap of being the only one clueless at the start of the adventure--but with the advantage of being good-looking, if not in the conventional sense, *and* smart. As if this were not enough, the Asian organized crime gets involved, as a dashing Chinese swordswoman and an enigmatic Naga dancer Bai Suzhen, the operational leader of the White Snake triad, joins the fray.

There is both beauty and danger aplenty on the Island of Big Tamtung. But it is not the "big-monster" type of dinosaurs that cannot be killed by a machine gun, like a Majungasaurus, that are the most dangerous animals on the island. Although small and vulnerable to a sword, a pack of Deinonychus is far more deadly, not merely thanks to their sharp claws but more so because of their pack tactics; they are smart enough to figure out how to climb onto a monorail! But even more dangerous are other humans. Stranded on the island, the team is torn apart by conflicting goals and loyalties, while also being pursued by the modern-day pirates. Escaping a Majungasaurus on a personal vendetta is nothing next to that.

Nor are the Deinonychus the smartest dinos on the island. Mark has done a great deal of research, and his (or rather, the paleontologist Dale Russell's) speculation that, had they survived to our time, the Troodon species of the warm-blooded dinosaurs may have evolved into an intelligent species is convincing enough. The appearance of this so-called anthroposaur is one of the highlights of the story, and Mark ties it to the numerous legends about the snake-like Naga people of the Asian antiquity.

An astute reader may notice a few text layout problems in the book. But they do not take away from the story. Cryptozoica is not to be missed, and I'm looking forward to the next book coming out of this husband-and-wife team.

This story is built on questions of the origins of man, Darwin and adventure. An easy read that draws you in quickly and keeps you guessing at the next clue. I thoroughly enjoyed the story, but found the plot a bit thin in parts. Great book for a relaxing bit of fun.

If Clive Cussler novels are an appetizer, Mark Ellis's Crypozoica is the main course with interesting complex characters and non-stop action on land, sea, and air. Jeff Slemons' illustrations are wonderful and really add to the storytelling and mood. The blending of myth, religion, and science are expertly done and are woven into the story compellingly. I found it a real page turner from beginning to end.

Something should also be said about the interior layout which, for a book lover like me, was very satisfying. Art Director Melissa Martin-Ellis did a terrific job with both the choice of font and incidental art that reinforced the mood of the story. The text was easy to read and the little dinos with the page numbers a nice touch.

Sure there's action and some carnage, but the main draw of this book is its Sense of Wonder. In a way it's a retro-styled throwback to the days of pulp fiction and men's adventure magazines. There's a breathless, almost break-neck, quality to the narrative with some brief quiet moments of speculation and real Science. Think of the best qualities of the film versions of THE LOST WORLD, KING KONG and, yes, even the first JURASSIC PARK and you'll get a glimpse of the fun you'll have reading this book.

This book had great potential to be every bit as good as Jurassic Park but too often the jargon filled monologues by some of the characters bogged downed the story. And it detracted from the sense of wonder and adventure that the story was trying to convey.

Cryptozoica is a rollicking adventure, a cross between a modern crime novel and a classic Lost World tale. It features vivid, compelling characters (my favorite is Mouzi) and enough twists and turns to keep you guessing. Not content with just people and dinosaurs, Ellis throws in a Triad gang war, a hidden society, a vast ages-spanning conspiracy, and hints at the beginnings of civilization, and perhaps the origins of life on Earth as well. Of course, there are plenty of pulse-pounding dinosaur scenes, too. This book has something for everyone, while -- at the same time -- retaining a tight and easy-to-follow narrative. Fisticuffs? Got it! Swordplay? Got that! Gun-Fu to do John Woo proud? You betcha! Loathsome villains & flawed heroes? Yep! Menacing dinosaurs & grizzly deaths? Cryptozoica's got those, too, in spades!

The only two drawbacks I had with the book were: 1) It wasn't available for Kindle, and 2) it suffers from a few typos and typesetting problems. The type issues, however, are no more than one usually finds in smaller press books -- and, frankly, not many more than one finds in big New-York-conglomerate publisher editions nowadays. The occasional funny line break or typo, though, is well worth having a book like this, which might never have seen the light of day if left to "A-List" publishers.

So, many thanks to the small press enterprise that published Cryptozoica, and even more thanks to Mark Ellis for bringing us such an entertaining Jurassic (or, more properly, Cretaceous) page-turner!