Off the Shelf
Alten’s ‘Shell Game’ kicks off summer reading roundup
The political thriller blends fact and fiction to forecast a frightening future
By LEE CLARK ZUMPE
Article published on Monday, June 9, 2008
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| “The Shell Game,” by Steve Alten; Sweetwater Books, 2008. |
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Long, sweltering summer days often force us to take shelter inside air-conditioned abodes or to languish poolside where a refreshing swim is only moments away.
Whether resting comfortably on the patio chaise lounge or relaxing on the living room sofa, summer is the perfect time to get lost between the pages of a bestseller.
Steve Alten’s cautionary novel “The Shell Game” might be a good place to start.
Alten, known for his novels “Meg” and “The Trench” which feature monstrous prehistoric sharks, exploits a different kind of terror in “The Shell Game” – extremism. The novel begins in 2007, as U.S. government agents recruit an American military intelligence officer. They detail a plan to detonate a nuclear bomb in a U.S. city in order to garner public support for a war with Iran.
Throughout the book, Alten convincingly builds a case for this outlandish plot by inserting a mix of historical facts, allegations from the fringe and quotes from a fictional memoir by Kelli Doyle, White House national security staff adviser from 2006 through 2010. She ends up dead, incidentally, presumably murdered by agents of the government to keep her from revealing the secret scheme to the masses.
“The Shell Game” is a conspiracy theorist’s fantasy and a pessimist’s nightmare. Examining the most difficult issues facing humanity in the 21st century, the novel gives a grim glimpse at what may await in the coming decades: the struggle to control dwindling oil reserves, food shortages leading to famine and the zeal with which extremists on both sides of the fence will pursue their own objectives. Alten allows the reader to see the energy quandary through the eyes of neoconservatives and spends equal time outlining the foundations of anti-Americanism among militant Islamists.
It is best to keep in mind that this is a work of fiction, offering the author’s speculative vision of one possible future. If nothing else, it is the kind of speculation that will likely leave many readers unsettled.
“The Shell Game,” published by Sweetwater Books, is available now.
Other books available now or due to hit the shelves in the coming weeks include:
- “The Strange Cases of Rudolph Pearson,” by William Jones, available now from Chaosium Inc. This compilation of cosmic horror and Cthulhu Mythos tales features Jones’ character Professor Rudolph Pearson facing a terrifying threat in a world full of the grotesque and the malefic.
- “The Broken Window,” by Jeffery Deaver, available now from Simon and Schuster. In the latest installment in the Lincoln Rhyme series, the forensic consultant for the New York Police Department and his detective partner, Amelia Sachs, take on a psychotic mastermind.
- “Old Flames,” by Jack Ketchum, available now from Dorchester Publishing. Horror master Ketchum offers readers a double bill of terror.
- “What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception,” by Scott McClellan, available now from PublicAffairs. McClellan, a former Bush loyalist, takes readers behind the scenes of the Bush presidency to illustrate what happened to take it off course.
- “Havemercy,” by Danielle Bennett and Jaida Jones, available June 24 from Bantam Books. The novel centers on Volstov’s hundred-year war with the Ke-Han and the elite fighting force of the Dragon Corps. With victory almost at hand, a scandal in Volstov involving one of the corps’ members threatens to bring down the kingdom. To counter the threat, four heroes come forward: an exiled magician, a naive country boy, a young student and the unpredictable ace airman who flies the city’s fiercest dragon, Havemercy.
- “The Last Oracle,” by James Rollins, available June 24 from HarperCollins Publishers. Rollins has thrown everything into this fifth Sigma Force novel, including the Oracle of Delphi, autistic savant children with strange implants behind their ears, Gypsies, power-mad Russians bent on unleashing enough radioactivity to poison the world, rogue American spy agencies and genetically enhanced wolves and tigers . . . oh my!
- “A Time It Was: Bobby Kennedy in the Sixties,” by Bill Eppridge, available June 28 from Abrams, Harry N. Inc. Bill Eppridge, a photographer for “Life,” followed and photographed Bobby Kennedy during his early campaign days up to his untimely death. The book features 200 full-color and black-and-white pictures, including dynamic images of the public Kennedy, as well as rare, intimate ones, many of which have never before been published.
- “Summer Affair,” by Elin Hilderbrand, available July 2 from Little, Brown and Company. When Sheila Crispin Cook, mother of four young children and nationally renowned glassblower, agrees to co-chair the Nantucket’s Children Summer Gala, she finds that she must balance loves past and present, family, business and high-powered social pressures.
- “The Last Patriot,” by Brad Thor, available July 1 from Simon and Schuster. Navy Seal turned covert Homeland Security operative Scot Harvath must race to locate an ancient secret that has the power to stop militant Islam dead in its tracks.
- “The Dangerous Days of Daniel X,” by James Patterson, available July 21 from Little, Brown and Company. The first book in a new series, the story follows Lee, an Alien Hunter. Equipped with a list of hidden alien outlaws who have taken refuge on Earth, Lee must track them and destroy them to keep them from taking over the planet.
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Article published on Monday, June 9, 2008
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