19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
action-packed thriller, June 3, 2008
Rumors fly that Albert Einstein formulated the unified field theory, but feared its release would lead to even more lethal weapons than the atom bomb; if true he took it to his grave. However some people think otherwise and he did discover the unified field theory and that a few still living know it.
Thus diverse players from the Feds to other countries to unscrupulous scientists and even a ruthless Russian mercenary seek the remaining direct link survivor. An intruder batters elderly theoretical physicist Hans Kleinman trying to make Einstein's assistant talk. Instead the torture sends Hans to the hospital near death. When Columbia University Professor David Swift visits his mentor, Hans babbles some enigmatic commentary in his native tongue about "Einheitliche Feldtheorie" with a numerical sequencing of equations that seem to combine the vastness of space with the nano of atoms just before he dies. However David becomes the new target fleeing for his life as he trusts no one not even the FBI except his former girlfriend Princeton physicist Monique Reynolds.
This is an action-packed thriller that takes off from the opening sequence and never slows down as David becomes the target of nasty folks who want to control the next weapon of pandemic destruction. The story line is fast-paced yet provides enough scientific theory to support Einstein's efforts to develop the Unified Field Theory equations. Fans will relish FINAL THEORY as this one never takes a breather while using as the plot's prime concept the reversal of the universally accepted belief Einstein never achieved the equations to prove his theory.
Harriet Klausner
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16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Exceptional!, June 2, 2008
The author combines a background in astrophysics and a career in journalism to lend remarkable realism and phenomenal narrative to this unique thriller. A rich menu of interesting and plausible characters traverse many intriguing locations, described with superb clarity, and all interwoven in a plot as clever, surprising and entertaining as any you will experience in this genre. The science backdrop is presented in a manner as satisfying to the layman as the PhD. For the reader less enamored with the thriller genre, the book is a beautiful work of prose, packed with literary gems. For the thriller buff, you might as well succumb to Mr. Alpert now rather than later. Any first novel this extraordinary is going to be followed by dozens more--and a mass readership. Absolutely five stars.
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11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
A real mixed bag..., July 26, 2008
The idea of a hidden Einstein Theory of Everything is a wonderful premise. And there are definitely things to like about this book. The writing is more than adequate from a style perspective; not great, but very good. Alpert does a little too much spoon feeding (telling the reader things that are blatantly obvious, as if the reader isn't smart enough to figure it out), but not enough to make the writing itself unpleasant. He also did an admirable job of working in twists that are so important to a story like this. The pacing was good, and the science was very nicely incorporated with a minimum of info-dumping. Then there are the problems...
It frustrates me to no end when an author won't do even the tiniest bit of research in order to get the details right on issues they know nothing about. For example, a character engages the safety on their revolver. Puh-leeze. Revolvers don't have safeties. (The only revolver that has a safety is an old western style single-action, definitely not the thing you tuck into the small of your back as did the character.) Things go from bad to worse when he approaches the issue of computers. A character "smashes" a computer on the floor and, voila, we have parts everywhere. Among these parts, he is able to spot the hard drive because it looks like a turntable with glass platters. He of course proceeds to smash the platters into tiny shards. Good grief. It takes five seconds on Google to see what a hard drive looks like. Or hey, walk into any computer store and ask them to let you hold one. Then get back to me on whether you saw platters and were able to "smash" them. Every time an author does something like this, it yanks you out of the story and it takes time to reestablish the immersion. I find this way too often with authors who obviously have zero understanding of things of the real world, whether the topic is cars, guns, computers, etc. It's frustrating, and so easily avoidable.
The more troubling issue with the book is the ultra-poor character development, both on the micro and macro levels. On the micro level, there's just little there to make one bond with the individual characters. They're stereotypical and wooden. On the macro level, the evil government is after the poor innocent little people while an evil Master Killer stalks them, as well. Yawn.
Finally, although it contributed absolutely nothing to the story, the author had to take time to inject his liberal politics. The evil vice-president with a crooked smile has to run the country for the "boob" from Texas. Again, yawn. Maybe the author found this cathartic, but it's an incredibly stupid thing to do in a book that has nothing to do with politics. By including elements like this, he added nothing to the story, but did manage to insult any conservative who happened to have bought and read his book. Nothing quite so smart as alienating half your potential market for no reason other than your own need to "vent."
All in all, it was a first book that had vast potential but in the end fell way short of the mark. Perhaps the author will read some of these reviews and take them to heart. Or perhaps not.
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