Series: Dirk Pitt Adventures | Publication Date: October 1, 1998
Dirk Pitt is the world's greatest adventure hero-- a man of action who lives by his wits and daring. As Special Projects Director for the U.S. National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA), he is cool and courageous, with a love of fast cars and extreme danger.
After an unknown force kills thousands of marine animals plus nearly two hundred people aboard a cruise ship, Dirk Pitt traces the destruction back to a merciless Australian millionaire. From a chilling escape at a high-security diamond mine to a tiny boat adrift on lonely, shark-infested seas, the ingenious Dirk Pitt races to stop a madman's ruthless plans-- before an unthinkable disaster claims millions of innocent lives!
In this explosive Dirk Pitt novel by the author of Inca Gold, Pitt meets the most intriguing and sinister villain of his adventurous and legendary career--a billionaire Australian diamond king with whom he must wage conflict above and below the sea for the survival of vast numbers of sea creatures and more than a million human beings. Only Clive Cussler--the Grandmaster of Adventure--could have written a story this suspenseful.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
The latest Dirk Pitt adventure pits him against an evil diamond tycoon. Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Clive Cussler began writing novels in 1965 and published his first work featuring his continuous series hero, Dirk Pitt(R), in 1973. His first non-fiction, The Sea Hunters, was released in 1996. The Board of Governors of the Maritime College, State University of New York, considered The Sea Hunters in lieu of a Ph.D. thesis and awarded Cussler a Doctor of Letters degree in May, 1997. It was the first time since the College was founded in 1874 that such a degree was bestowed. Cussler is an internationally recognized authority on shipwrecks and the founder of the National Underwater and Marine Agency, (NUMA) a 501C3 non-profit organization (named after the fictional Federal agency in his novels) that dedicates itself to preserving American maritime and naval history. He and his crew of marine experts and NUMA volunteers have discovered more than 60 historically significant underwater wreck sites including the first submarine to sink a ship in battle, the Confederacy's Hunley, and its victim, the Union's Housatonic; the U-20, the U-boat that sank the Lusitania; the Cumberland, which was sunk by the famous ironclad, Merrimack; the renowned Confederate raider Florida; the Navy airship, Akron, the Republic of Texas Navy warship, Zavala, found under a parking lot in Galveston, and the Carpathia, which sank almost six years to-the-day after plucking Titanic's survivors from the sea. In September, 1998, NUMA - which turns over all artifacts to state and Federal authorities, or donates them to museums and universities - launched its own web site for those wishing more information about maritime history or wishing to make donations to the organization. In addition to being the Chairman of NUMA, Cussler is also a fellow in both the Explorers Club of New York and the Royal Geographic Society in London. He has been honored with the Lowell Thomas Award for outstanding underwater exploration. Cussler's books have been published in more than 40 languages in more than 100 countries. His past international bestsellers include Pacific Vortex, Mediterranean Caper, Iceberg, Raise the Titanic, Vixen 03, Night Probe, Deep Six, Cyclops, Treasure, Dragon, Sahara, Inca Gold, Shock Wave, Flood Tide, Atlantis Found, Valhalla Rising, Trojan Odyssey, Black Wind, Treasure of Kahn and Arctic Drift (the last three with his son, Dirk Cussler) as well as The Chase; the nonfiction books The Sea Hunters, The Sea Hunters II and Clive Cussler and Dirk Pitt (R) Revealed; the NUMA(R) Files novels Serpent, Blue Gold, Fire Ice, White Death, Lost City, Polar Shift, The Navigator and Medusa (written with Paul Kemprecos); and the Oregon Files novels Sacred Stone and Golden Buddha (written with Craig Dirgo) and Dark Watch, Skeleton Coast, Plague Ship and Corsair (written with Jack Du Brul). Clive Cussler lives in Arizona.
You have to take Clive Cussler's books for what they are. He presents his protagonist, Dirk Pitt, as a James Bond type hero except that he operates at sea. A very well written plot with a great ending, unique characters, intense action, make this novel one of Cussler's finest works that I've read so far. However, for some reason, people do not discuss this book as one of Cussler's finest works in the same vein as Sahara.
My only disappointment was that Julien Perlmutter, his obese marine historian, does not make any appearances. He's one of Cussler's most interesting characters.
I would definitely recommend Shockwave.
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Getting started in this Dirk Pitt novel, I recognized all the familiar elements - the damsel in distress, the Pittian rescue, the daring reconnaissance the greedy, secretive and all-powerful billionaire with his wicked worldwide plot, etcetera. After the historical intro sequence, with its harrowing tale of the shipwreck of an Australia-bound prison ship, I found it ho-hum - until about halfway through the book. It really takes off when Dirk, Al and damsel Maeve Fletcher are set adrift in a small boat in the South Seas. Cussler gives this part of the story the good, long ride it deserves, and Dirk's ingenuity rises to new heights as the trio survive to make not one but two unlikely landfalls. Maeve Fletcher rises above heroines of other novels to become an alltime and unforgettable love of Pitt's life along with Summer Moran. The monster threat of this book - amplified sound waves travelling thousands of miles through water that do terrible damage if several converge - is a little vague and somewhat implausible, and the climactic sequence, which I won't giveaway, contains at least one apparent inconsistency.
Still, a fine book. And the zoologist Maeve Fletcher's discourse on the factual basis behind the sightings of sea monsters is so well done that it has me wondering how much of this might actually be true (as opposed to how much of a yarn old seadog Cussler is spinning here.)
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Shock Wave is a great book for many reasons. A few are the fact the Clusser makes his characters, settings, and the situations in his books believable. I am really into the fact that a book has to be realistic to please me and I really enjoyed it. Firstly his characters, his characters don't have these seemingly impossible abilities, they are average people that when it comes time to do something they take care of it. Such is the description of the main character, Dirk Pitt who is part of the NUMA underwater research association is described as tall, muscular, and cool. His long time friend and partner Al who adds the comic part to Clusser's novels is always trying to get girl or making a joke about the situation they're in. All the settings in the book are real places which range from the Arctic to the Caribbean islands, another thing I liked about the way the book was written was that the characters don't jump magically from setting to setting either and how they get from place to place is explained so as not to lose the reader. Finally, the situations that Pitt finds himself in are quite believable for a man is his position. He does everything from stop a cruise liner from running ashore to masquerading as an engineer in a diamond mine to find the cause of a deadly sea plague. In conclusion I think that this is a great book to read because of it's realism and how it flows through the story at a reasonably fast pace to keep you hooked.
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