* In the heart of the Atlantic, help is a horizon too far. *
The pirates struck in the dead of night, 1,700 miles from any shore.
Armed raiders have hijacked a cruise ship, and retired crisis negotiator Johnathan Harper finds himself back in his old line of work. Except this time, he's inside the locked room, too, grappling with the ghosts of the greatest failure of his career.
With much of the crew ejected by the pirates, not many remain who know the ship as intimately as Willa Thompson does. Now, she has to leverage this knowledge in a deadly game of cat and mouse, trying to unravel the enemy's tightly wound plans.
Elsewhere on the ship, travel blogger Nina Collins unexpectedly finds herself leading a band of tourists planning a daring resistance. But as rumors swirl about pirate infiltrators posing as guests, Nina is faced with an impossible choice: trust, or survive.
As the Navy closes in, John, Willa and Nina find themselves in a perilous web of deceit and dangerâwhere one false step could send them all to the ocean floor.
* In the heart of the Atlantic, help is a horizon too far. *
The pirates struck in the dead of night, 1,700 miles from any shore.
Armed raiders have hijacked a cruise ship, and retired crisis negotiator Johnathan Harper finds himself back in his old line of work. Except this time, he's inside the locked room, too, grappling with the ghosts of the greatest failure of his career.
With much of the crew ejected by the pirates, not many remain who know the ship as intimately as Willa Thompson does. Now, she has to leverage this knowledge in a deadly game of cat and mouse, trying to unravel the enemy's tightly wound plans.
Elsewhere on the ship, travel blogger Nina Collins unexpectedly finds herself leading a band of tourists planning a daring resistance. But as rumors swirl about pirate infiltrators posing as guests, Nina is faced with an impossible choice: trust, or survive.
As the Navy closes in, John, Willa and Nina find themselves in a perilous web of deceit and dangerâwhere one false step could send them all to the ocean floor.
25 hours and 49 minutes until hostile boarding
Reggae covers of pop music floated through the lazy breeze; the air was thick with the smell of suntan oil and chlorine.
The margarita on the man's table had perhaps once been frozen, but the sun had turned it to sugary slurry that glowed brighter than any respectable drink should. Condensation wicked on the red plastic mug, and it rolled down to form wet rings on the table, which pooled and dripped onto the lap of the table's lone inhabitant.
Octavio wore a button-down Hawaiian shirt and white cotton pants. Sunglasses concealed his gaze. He kept his head pensively still as his eyes crept across the solarium, lingering on each person in the hot tubs, the pools, the recliners. Finally, at long last, he found a suitable target: the woman was alone. She sat in one of the perimeter hot tubs, arms crossed, a barely concealed scowl on her face.
She would do well enough.
Octavio opened his camera app and pinched two fingers to zoom the camera in to its maximum. He then extended his arm and smiled his widest, brightest smile, raising his margarita glass in a vacationer's selfie pose. With a press of a button on the side of the camera, he snapped his photograph. It, of course, wasn't a selfie, but distant observers might've been convinced.
The older woman at the next table tutted and shook her head; his screen pointed her way, so she'd probably assumed Octavio was some sort of pervert. Given what she'd seen, it was the conclusion that made the most sense. But the details she hadn't seen told a different story entirely.
When Octavio snapped his photo of the woman in the hot tub, that picture had become the very first image to enter the phone's memory. When Octavio had opened the camera app, he'd done so from a home screen filled with only default apps, mere minutes after dismissing an OS message that said "Welcome, USER!" There was a notecard in his Velcro-sealed pocket with strange codes written on it⌠today was the day he would have to lose the card, but the contents were long-since memorized. And his melted margarita's glass was as full as it had been when he ordered it: tonight would be sober work.
He stood and brushed himself off, heading back for the elevator lobby. His fingers tapped his screen as he walked, accepting the terms and conditions to connect to ShipFi. As the elevator beeped, announcing its arrival, he'd loaded the proper website, greeted by only its white emptiness and a single textbox. As he stepped into the glass elevator, he refrained from inputting his passcode, for he knew there were cameras overhead. He instead tucked the phone back in his pocket and waited, hands clasped behind his back.
"Deck 7," the elevator speakers announced, carriage coming to a halt. Octavio alighted, following the signs for room 7016. Once at his room, he placed the "do not disturb" card around his door handle and locked the door securely from the inside. Then, and only then, did he log in to the strange, empty website, finding himself greeted by the message "Welcome, 299." He then found the button that said "upload." He selected the photo of the woman in the hot tub and tapped to confirm. In seconds, it was done.
Far down the hall, another man typed his code into the input box on the empty white website. Upon login, he received a notification: "Welcome, 615. Photo assigned." He tapped to open and was greeted by a photo of a woman sitting in a hot tub, a scowl on her face⌠615 took a bite from an unsliced bagel courtesy of the buffet upstairs, chewing slowly as he tried to commit the face to memory. One floor below the bagel muncher and six rooms to the right, a woman emerged from the shower to find the same message waiting for her. She tapped to zoom into the photo of the hot-tub scowler, making mental notes of the face proportions. Down the hall aft, a few dozen rooms away, a nineteen-year-old kid with hardly a patch of neck scruff opened the same photo, glad that his was pretty at leastâmuch easier to memorize. On and on it went, the photo making quiet, secret ripples across the ship.
Octavio would never know how many, nor would he even know who had received his picture. In fact, as his phone told him "Photo assigned" and loaded an image of a portly man sitting by the pool deck shirtless with a cigar in-hand, Octavio knew neither who had taken this new picture nor how many others like him were seeing it. Things were safer that way.
Octavio looked to the closet in his room, excitement rising. Behind his few hanging collared shirts and single suit jacket sat the room's safe, tightly locked. No matter who had received his picture, there was one thing Octavio knew: its unknown recipientsâthe bagel-muncher, the showerer, the young kidâthey would also have secrets stowed in their rooms' safes. And tonight, when the clock struck three in the morning, those safes would be unlocked.
He was Octavio no longer⌠Mr. 299 now, and Mr. 299 he would remain until the operation's end.
All aboard for a high-octane adventure on the high seas in this lightning-quick thriller by Drew Harrison.
âCaptain Oneâ and "crewâ have just taken over the cruise ship Halcyon. The Halcyon has like, nine million innocent tourists aboard. And the pirates have an incredibly intricate plan to get Everything They Want. (The pirates, not the tourists. Tourists are all taken hostage.) The hostages include one Johnathan Harper, retired FBI crisis negotiator. Harperâs just trying to enjoy a floating vacation. Maybe find a few friends. Enjoy a little light romance reading, stress-free.
Oops.
Cuz the âCaptainâ and buds have other plans. None of them good. They include scuttling the entire ship if the U.S. Navy or anyone else tries to board or intervene in any way.
Anyway, Harper and travel blogger Nina Collins may have something up their sleeves. Or not. But things are getting pretty dicey aboard the Un-Love Boat. And someone has to come up with a plan to foil the pirates and take back the ship. But who? And how? Oh yeah. Thereâs also that pesky detail about masks and crew unis. Both are worn by pirates and tourists, the latter under duress. And when you canât tell friend from foe, who do you aim at?
Regarding pirates, I'm not talking the Disney ride near the Blue Bayou. No siree, Blackbeard! These pirates are ruthless. Take âCaptain One,â for example. He gives pond scum a bad name. So does âMr. Two.â (Youâll get that if you read the book.)
Thereâs also Davy Jonesâs Locker. âSkeevy.â (Skeevy?!) âWas any of it⌠even real?â Zero. âDark-matter-shaped hole in the situation.â How could we not? â⌠as empty as an MPâs head.â Raleigh. Borneo. Cousin. âReality doesnât get to cross that line.â
So I was gonna dip a toe or two into this book. Just to get a feel for it. A nibble from the sampler platter. Next thing I knew, I was fourteen chapters in and goinâ for broke. Like, I skipped 'second breakfast, elevenses and afternoon teaâ to finish this book. Itâs lightning fast. With more plot twists and turns than Iowaâs Snake Alley. So ya might want to pack some Dramamine. Just sayinâ.
On the other hand, a coupla loose ends are left dangling. Like what became of Ms. Rolex and a certain pirate-ette who let someone âescapeâ? What was Ms. Pirate-etteâs motive? Thereâs also a coupla typos. Like, âdisengaging form their grappleâ (p. 275). But these are rare and donât detract from the overall read. Which is kinda like strapping into the Millenium Force at Cedar Point.
Tightly written and as tense as a wound watch spring, The Halycon Crisis runs on high octane from chapter one to the last page. Harrisonâs finely crafted descriptions, well-rounded characters, and expert word-smithing draw you in from the get-go.Â
The amount of energy, focus, and sheer creativity rippling throughout this read is epic. So keep an eye on this talented author. He's going places. But hopefully not aboard another cruise ship.