I was hesitant to read these next two books because I quite frankly didn’t see much “science fiction” in the first book, “Unfathomed”. Well, I can tell you now that I’m very, very glad I read this one and the final book, “Osiris”. This is one heck of a story. I can’t believe how well written the whole series turned out. How do authors come up with all these details?
This book, “Expedition” gives us a lot of backstory about Karl Grayson and his tie-in to Mr. Conrad Wakefield. Right now, if you were reading the book like me, you didn’t like Grayson much. He was a man on a mission, but we didn’t know much about why. You’ll find out very soon why. I think you’ll also find out you can’t stand Conrad Wakefield after you find out what he did. And that’s the big problem. Soon everyone is going to find out what his secret is and he’s not the only one implicated. Even Admiral John Reynolds, one of the supposed “good guys”, isn’t so good.
Ok, so where did everyone go? Well, at the very last of the first book, the M/S Atlantica, the USS Paul Ignatius, and a collection of pirate vessels where heading towards a supposed weather disturbance much like what they encountered just before they found themselves in a completely different world. From that disturbance emerged another ship, the Osiris which turns out to be a very, very significant event.
The Osiris’ owner, Conrad Wakefield, “billionaire technology magnate” was aboard and he had the explanation as to how all of this happened. You need to read Chapter 64 – Day 24 very closely to understand how these ships and people came to be where they are now, 10 million years in the future! Still, I’m a little confused on why everyone seemed to arrive at different times. Maybe you can figure that out.
For the most part in this book, everyone is working together to establish some kind of “colony” on the only piece of land in this entire area. The pirates have began devoting themselves to farming the land with the help of those on the Atlantica. Remember, there are thousands of people on that cruise liner, most with nothing to do, so some of them see the need to pitch-in and help get their farming effort working out.
Then they spot something black coming out of a mountain about fifty miles away from their community. A helicopter is dispatched to investigate when a geologist aboard the Atlantica tells everyone that such a mountain peak shouldn’t even exist there and certainly not an active volcano. Little did they know that this mountain and what came out it was going to be a very big problem. These people aren’t getting any breaks!
So, getting back to the backstory about Karl Grayson and Conrad Wakefield. It’s all very interesting and kind of explains a lot. Still, the determination of Karl Grayson in completing his mission is shocking. This guy doesn’t quit. You’ll see that Jack Cohen, a Marine now out of the service, is still a very capable guy who can give Grayson a lot of trouble if he wants to. And then you have the USS Ignatius. That’s a war ship with a very aggressive Captain commanding. What will this ship, it’s Captain and crew do if everything stays peaceful? Ah, that won’t happen, will it?
I think once you get into the meat of this book, you won’t want to stop and will continue on with the third and final book in the series, “Osiris”. What I hope to find in this final book is an good explanation and the end to a lot of different things. There’s things going on that need to be finally explained, people need to be rescued and what’s going to happen to everybody?