Customer Reviews

Extinction

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Ray Hammond's second effort, `Extinction' apparently "explodes off the page with the dramatic force of a smart bomb' according to one rather over enthusiastic periodical on the front jacket. Perhaps a trifle overstated but nevertheless, this packs the kind of techno-thriller punch one would expect from say, Crichton.
Hammond's premise is the fulfilment of the line `And the meek shall inherit the Earth' as the left over cast extras from Waterworld find themselves floating around the Southern Ocean, shunned by a futuristic earth where we seem to have gone so eco-friendly we've harnessed the power of the sun itself to create a huge global corporation that controls the very weather. Tampering with delicate Gaian systems at its arrogant worst. Having set the global scale of the imminent catastrophe before us, our author presents us with a select group of misunderstood scientists who manage to see the truth at the eleventh hour and desperately try to stop the evil corporation and its lackey governments. By failing dismally this means the author can treat us to no less than Armageddon, polar reversals and the emergence of a nice clean planet.
The story focuses around lawyer Michael Fairfax who is attempting to launch a huge writ against the Ergia climate control corporation who are about to launch a new venture of generating solar power reflected from the moon. Covering this huge news story is Perdy Curtis of the BBC whilst we have our geophysicist, Dr Emilia Knight, who becomes increasingly aware that all the volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are part of a greater change in the planet.
So, Hammond takes us on a rollercoaster ride as San Francisco is flattened, the Samoan volcanoes erupt, Vesuvius and Etna lose their top and one by one every earthquake and volcanic zone starts venting her fury upon the hapless human race. By the time Cumbre Vieja slides into the Atlantic and washes out the entire eastern US seaboard there is a horrified group of people on the Moon watching the Earth's polar reversal and tectonic upheaval that effectively shrouds the planet in cloud for months and erases nearly all life.
There is the habitual rebirth, along with it a much chastened and more humble remnant of humanity with a greater respect for the planet that tolerates our existence that gives hope for a brighter and cleaner future.
All in all this is a novel that passes away the time on that long plane or train journey. The plot is world-shaking and the action would do justice to a Hollywood blockbuster. The novel is very screenplay in approach, the characters fairly static and standard for this type of end-of-the-world scenario. They are tolerable without engendering much empathy and you put down the novel having been entertained for a few hours. Worth a read if you like techno-thrillers or end-of-the-world books.