The Five Greatest Warriors, Mathew Reilly, Orion Publishing Group Ltd (Hachette India), Pp 459, Rs 595.00 (HB)
THE world is going to end and only one man can save it. And that too only if he manages to unravel an ancient text. That in a nutshell is the plot of the novel The Five Greatest Warriors by Mathew Reilly. It is sequential to two of his previous novels Seven Ancient Wonders and The Six Sacred Stones.
The Sun’s dark twin called the Dark Star is set on destroying the world. The first book of this series had the protagonist Jack West Jr successfully managing to Capstone in its place on a pyramid in Egypt, before a solar event Tartarus Rotation. This was a precursor to the moves of Dark Star. In the second book the story revolved around a thing called The Machine, which if rebuilt could repel the negative energies of the Dark Star and save the earth. This involved unearthing six magnificent underground shrines, each built in the shape of inverted bronze pyramid. In each of these a pillar has to be set in place. But the story ended with the planting of only two pillars by Jack West’s father. Now the mission continues. Jack West Jr is helped by a team of people collected from across the world (no Indian mentioned please). The plot is thick with other missions trying to locate the six temples. There is a triple alliance between Caldwell group from America, team from China and a team sponsored by Saudi Arabia. There are a lot of betrayal scenes and cliff hanger situations.
Four of the five warriors are Moses, Jesus, Genghis Khan and Napoleon. And no prices for guessing the fifth, it is Jack West Jr. The novel is set in today, so the conversations are replete with current swears. But the text is ancient and that bridges a huge time gap. An interesting novel for those who fancy out of the world science fiction. —DVN
(Orion Publishing Group Ltd,Orion house, 5 upper saint martin’s lane London WC2H 9EA. Available with Hachette India)
