Ice Tomb

By Deborah Jackson

Book Overview

The year is 2015. Deep within the Antarctic Ice Sheet a hotspot suddenly appears on satellite tracking. The US science team, sent from McMurdo Station to investigate, finds an icy graveyard. Minutes... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1931468192
• ISBN13: 9781931468190
• Release Date: January 2004
• Publisher: Invisible College Press
• Length: 325 Pages
• Weight: 1.02 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.7" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

terrific science fiction

In 2015, volcanologist Erica Daniels believes she will be named as the crater impact specialist on NASA's mission to establish moon base. To her chagrin, her bitter rival David Marsh, who stole her thesis when they were academic lovers, gets the assignment. However, Dr. Albert of NASA offers Erica a different project where he believes her expertise is badly needed. In Antarctica, a hotspot inside the ice has been found and investigated by scientists at the McMurdo Station, several are missing and apparently dead; global warming has been ruled out as the heating seems to come from a machine that one of the doomed scientists claimed is similar to a gigantic MRI. Accompanying Erica on this quest is archeologist, Allan Rocheford, who plans to prove Atlantis existed, but he is also know for selling his finds to the highest bidder. Erica's mission is to learn how big a threat to the world that recently included China as a member of the growing democracy club is this phenomena. ICE TOMB is a terrific science fiction that works on several levels because the scientists seem real as jealousy, intellectual thievery and ambition get in the way of solid research. The story line is fast-paced with aggressive Erica bullying everyone in sight providing much of the first person perspective. At times the plot switches to David on the moon. This occurs especially when he knows he must face the lioness he betrayed for her opinion on what he as found. Readers will enjoy this strong thriller. Harriet Klausner

Recommended Read

You've all heard the old adage "don't judge a book by its cover;" but somehow, when a hard SF book that purports to be well researched, is set in Antarctica, but has a polar bear on the cover, one really begins to wonder. Fortunately, the science inside the book, while at times highly speculative, seems pretty accurate. As a scientist myself I must admit that the author has captured the scientist mindset, and while a number of themes such as Atlantean super-technology, moon colonization and unscrupulous media-seeking scientists aren't anything new, they are employed in a well-coordinated, entertaining and -- for all the SF and fantasy that has been set in Antarctica -- fairly original manner. In Ice Tomb a new hotspot develops in the Antarctic Ice Sheet, which isn't entirely odd since Antarctica is seismically and volcanically active, but when those who investigate the site disappear, it's time to send in someone who knows what they might be up against. Erica Daniels, a vulcanologist, is summoned by NASA, thinking she has been chosen as head geologist for an expedition seeking to prepare the colonisation of the moon. So when the ex-lover who betrayed her gets the job, she's assigned to the Antarctica hot spot project, and she's saddled with a media-hungry archæologist with a bent for finding Atlantis along with a bunch of gung-ho armed-to-the-teeth marines, she's not a happy camper. What she will find in the barrens of Antarctica will bring her and her ex back together, demonstrate there's something to that old Atlantean super-technology, and, oh yes, determine the fate of the human race in the face a massive impending meteor impact. Stories of lost races (or their artefacts) in Antarctica go way back, Robert Paltock's The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins (1751) being perhaps the earliest. Oddly enough, be it the author's avowed reading of much SF and fantasy informing her writing, or merely coincidence, one can find a number of parallels with the incidents in Ice Tomb and a number of older tales. For example, in Gustavus Pope's Journey to Mars (1894), Martians have a landing field in Antarctica, and are at risk when a meteor shower threatens to strip a moon away from their planet. Along those lines is José Moselli's "Le Messager de la Planète" (in L'Almanach Scientifique, 1925), where a pair of Norwegian explorers, one a geologist, discover an alien spacecraft which is melting the ice around it; before their sled dog kills the alien aboard, they are shown instant video linkup to his home planet, and a number of other nifty technologies. And of course, for people disappearing mysteriously in Antarctica, and the paranoia surrounding it, one cannot forget John W. Campbell, Jr's novella "Who Goes There?" (1938) [the basis of the films The Thing From Another World (1951) and more recently The Thing (1982)]. That said, Deborah Jackson does create believable characters, and manages to present the more esoteric technologies without great gobs

A Page-Turner

In reading Deborah Jackson's book "Ice Tomb", I was quickly drawn into the intrigue and romance - a real page-turner. Ms. Jackson has demonstrated a love of science and adventure in this novel. She has portrayed her characters in a very believable and enjoyable fashion. I look forward to reading her next novel.

Fast Paced Read

I don't usually read science fiction, however, I may just change my mind after reading Ms. Jackson's Ice Tomb. The characters are well developed and easy to identify with. The plot has intrigue and suspense, and I found it hard to put the book down. I was hooked after the first chapter. I highly recommend this book, especially if you love an eclectic mix of well crafted suspense, mystery, romance and a good dollop of believable science fiction, then this book is for you.

In quest of "hot spots"

In 1929, a map of the New World dated 1513 CE was discovered. Highly detailed, the cartographer declared in his notes that he had drawn on many sources, some quite ancient, to produce the chart. The cartographer was a Turkish Admiral and the chart became known as the Piri Reis Map. Among its mysteries, it depicted a detailed shoreline of Antarctica. The Piri Reis Map becomes a key element in Deborah Jackson's adventurous tale of scientists confronting bizarre mysteries in harsh conditions. Erica Daniels is a mountain climber. She's a vulcanologist and the mountains she climbs are capable of ejecting her from their slopes - along with tons of rock, ash and lava. Erica has had more than mountains to conquer. The machinations of ambitious men have been as severe a hazard as any pyroclastic flow. In university, her career well planned and ready to be undertaken, her lover decamps with her thesis to initiate his own success. As a result, David Marsh becomes a noted geologist. He's crafty and ambitious, rising to be chosen to investigate craters on the moon for water and minerals. Chance observations of our neighbour in space have indicated the possibility that Luna may not be as dead as is thought. If the moon has geological activity, it will have serious implications for any colony. NASA has already taken the first step with a HAB base constructed only nine years from now. In Jackson's story, the year 2015 will be portentious. Relations with China will have improved to the point where an astronaut from there will be joining Marsh on his expedition. There are interesting lunar features to explore and Marsh is the best researcher available. Or is he? Although Daniels and Marsh carry abrasive memories of their past relationship, Jackson's story keeps them interacting at several levels. Erica has been called away from an Alaskan climb that threatened to extinguish her abilities - along with herself - to journey to the other Pole. From a "hotspot" atop an Alaskan mountain, she's been asked to cross the globe to Antarctica. Another "hotspot" - one that shouldn't exist - has been reported on the southernmost continent. Worse, it seems to have been gobbling up people. On her way, Erica encounters archaeologist Allan Rocheford. Inexplicably, this desert digger is also interested in the Antarctic hotspot. He has an idea of why it's there and what it implies. He's found something in a dig in Egypt that relates to the evidence given by the Piri Reis map - Antarctica hasn't always enjoyed the conditions there now. Is the "hotspot" under the ice an alien artefact? Or something even more profound? Marsh arrives on the moon and begins exploring one of the mysterious "rilles" - deep ravines that stretch over the moonscape. He encounters wholly unexpected conditions. "Lava tubes" are a phenomenon of some Earth volcanoes. They are the result of quick surface cooling of molten magma leaving the interior still fluid and flowing. The re