Enter Admiral Viktor Petkov, commander of the Russian Northern Fleet. Petkov's father oversaw Grendel's research facility...and Petkov is determined to restore his father's legacy, even if it means throwing the world into a new ice age...

Matt Pike is a Fish and Game officer, former Green Beret, and divorced from Inuit sheriff Jennifer Aratuk. The couple find themselves in the middle of events, thanks to a mysterious reporter who still has a few secrets up his proverbial sleeve.

Along with a whole slew of characters, they are about to discover the secrets of Ice Station Grendel, and are about to experience the most horrifying days of their lives. Because in a covert battle between the Russian and American governments, the enemy isn't always clear, and those closest to you may in fact be your worst enemies.

James Rollins has written some outstanding novels. His first, "Subterranean," remains one of my favorite books of all time. "Ice Station" comes close to topping that list, too. With all the adventure of his previous four books, plus some amazing character development (even the evil Petkov is drawn as a human figure; I felt myself feeling sorry for the poor guy several times), "Ice Hunt" is a bonafide thrilling ride. It fits the two big "U's" of great suspense novels: unpredictable and unforgettable.

Ice Hunt presents a vivid sense of place, whether in the "Cyclops" chamber of a research submarine, the Brooks Range in Alaska, or the turns and wormhole twists of a creepy crawlspace carved into the polar ice. Rollins weaves science and nature into the plot (boy, does he!) and lets characters use their expertise in their own branch of science to deal what is thrown at them. I recommend this heartily. The only caution I have is: be careful how much caffeine you drink before and while reading. This story will get your blood pumping!

I recently read SandStorm a few weeks ago and, for the first time ever, posted my first review. Being SO moved by SandStorm, I hurried out and bought the paper back Ice Hunt.

Rollins Woooooowwwwwed me again.

Can you say "OH MY GOSH!" True to form, I am again driven to state my opinion here. Ok, I am shouting at the roof tops "READ THIS BOOK!" This is a must for any curriculum. Did you hear me?

Ice Hunt is like meeting the love of your life for the first time. When you meet that love...you are excited and you can wait to see that person again. Well, Ice Hunt is the love of your life. Your mind will bend and go places you didn't imagine possible.

Ice Hunt! Ice Hunt! Ice Hunt! Ice Hunt! Ice Hunt! Ice Hunt! Hum....I guess you could say I have quickly become a Rollins fan.

Ok, to the point. I finished reading ICE HUNT last night. In the same fashion as SandStorm, "Ice Hunt is an experience". To quote myself from my last review about SandStorm, I must say that Ice Hun is also another visual and intellectual feast cleverly weaving you into a heart pounding non-stop journey filled with intrigue. Once you being reading, you become glued to the first page until the grand finish. DID I SAY GRAND! CAUTION. YOU WILL LOOSE SLEEP! I was up til ungodly hours of the morning.

A few quick notes. Might I add, Rollins IS A GENIUS! AND WELL INFORMED. I must say, the geography, language, and science is dead on. I don't know about you. When I don't know a place, word, fact, or unsure of something. I LOOK IT UP! I want to know the facts. Rollins doesn't pull punches but he certainly delivers!

Rollins books, or at least the two I have read thus far, are an INFORMATION FEAST.

About the story:

The story starts with a pitched battle between a game warden (former Green Beret) and two killers. What is soooooo awesome is how Rollins creates his characters with such depth. For example, one of the characters in Ice hunt, the warden, uses his own knowledge of the terrain and, shall we say, its inhabitants to save himself and an injured man. NOW THIS IS PURE GENIUS! It makes perfect sense, yet still catches you by surprise!

Like SandStorm, Hop on...cause you are on a ride for your life. Ice Hunt is another roller coaster ride of adventure to the top of the world. And once you reach the top...what is found there will disturb as much as it thrills. As I said before, when I want to know something in question I look it up. I was so taken aback that I even ended up doing some research on the science behind Ice Hunt--and found out all of it is real, based on current research! Even the genetics done on Arctic frogs...and where that takes you...wow, " READ THIS BOOK!"

But mostly the story moved me. Yes, I am a sentimental sap...I get verklempt! The plight of Matt and Jenny, their shared tragic past, the failure of their marriage, their faltering first steps at reconciliation. I was amazed that such emotional resonance can be duplicated and found within the pages of an "action" novel. Wew...shocker of all shockers...the ending caught me by total surprise. I truly had expected one thing but of course, only a state of the art author such as Rollins can elegantly take you into another direction...and it made more sense. It felt good. Both bittersweet and hopeful. But I dare say no more.

And as for the fate of the villian in this novel. Simply stated, "Pure brilliance!"

If you haven't read a book by Rollins, do so. Now! As I said twice before, "READ THIS BOOK!" In fact, Start here or with Sandstorm.

Ooops, I forgot: a professional editor from a large publishing house is brought in to create the action-oriented landscape-depicting, technical-manual-quoting mumble (Ask youself: why Rollins sounds just like Patterson? and King? and Parks? and Newsweek?)

Mr. Rollins is a parasite: he exploits the woefully uneducated, but instead of letting the reader learn and grow he waves a net of poor research and destructive pseudo-ethics -- and covers it all with the trademark phrase: "Trust me, I am a veterinarian."

Rollins' saga is barely passable. A Fish and Game ranger (even with the Green-est Beret background) escaping two professional killers? -- As passable as the President of the US killing a man with his bare hands ('Air Force One', a.k.a "they will swallow anything")

I have no idea how Rollins scored on his biochemistry tests (hopefully, poor -- or there is no truth in testing) but the twenty or so genes that encode proteins that make glucose from glycogen are INDEED present in all mammals BECAUSE we store glucose as glycogen -- and disassemble it whenever we need sugar. Using this as the explanation of cryostasis in the arctic frog (or in "grendels" -- or in humans) is pitiable.

The name of the ice-station is, apparently such a big deal that it is repeated several times in its original Russian (printed in Cyrillic) -- Grendel... Grendel... Grendel... Clearly, the fact-checker didn't bother to wake up that morning. In Russian the name of the creature is GrendeL' (two letters are used: "L" and "SOFT SIGN") -- nobody would call this station Grendel-with-a-hard-L.

(Funny: in Rollins' ancestral language (Polish) there is an L and an L-slash. He should know better... but once again he chose the barely passable. I can almost hear the dialog: "But in Russian 'Grendel' is spelled with 8 letters" -- "That's too confusing. The unwashed masses won't understand.)

Admittingly, Russian is hard and the culture of Russia/USSR may be irrelevant. This may explain the insufferable cliches: FSB/KGB is running the country; Fleet Admiral reads (but what else?) 'Brothers Karamazov' before attempting to destroy the world; a submarine CO (a thirty year old Captain (?!) is sarcastic while talking to a Fleet Admiral. Americans are as bad as Russians (Operation Paper Clip etc.) but win nonetheless.

My biggest problem with this frosted fiction is not its paper-pulp-back-fiction quality. This is, after all, a 7.99-window-or-aisle-book.

The problem is its lack of morals. I don't believe Rollins even understands what's at stake.

A child is frozen alive in an OBVIOUSLY criminally inethical experiment (similar to what Nazi "doctors" did to POW) but everything ends happily: the kid is defrosted and is damn happy with his adoptive parents.

A veterinarian may not see the finer point here: ANY criminal experiment on ONE human being is a catastrophy for ALL humanity. Making it into a (barely passable) happy ending borders on cheering for the Nazis: what we do is inethical but it still ends well.

This is (1) a surreptitious justification for playing God. To Rollins science is omni-benevolent: even a criminally-warped science will somehow lead us to justice. After all, bad guy Craig is punished, and the frozen kid is happy

(Maybe Rollins should read some Dostoyevsky: "if there is no God than everything is allowable." = When scientists play God then everything is allowable?! Because it will all sort itself out?!)

(2) this also lends a hand to the Bible-thumpers of all sorts: see, folks, if not for the miracle (God's intervention) the kid would've been lost and evil would've not been punished.

(Brilliant! It will sell to both the religious right and the scientistic left! Congrats, Mr.(Dr.) Rollins!)

There *was* a simple (and ethically acceptable) save -- but Rollings is not a good enough writer to consider it: turn the kid into a character, not a cliche. Have him suffer from nightmares (after all, his consciousness was awake for 60 years!), cry for his mother, develop cold sores and unexplained sadness. Make the reader understand: any attempt to "play God" -- or to "know exactly what God intends" is harmful and the harm is lasting.

Grade: F+. A perfect example of 'literature' borne out by the self-perpetuating lack of education and foresight in our society. There is no reason to read Mr.(Dr.) Rollins when Jules Verne is still in print. (There was a man who honestly wanted to educate his reader.)

Side note. Want to *learn* something? Want to be *more* human? Read the *real* Grendel, a very decent book by John Champlin Gardner (ISBN: 0679723110) Available at Amazon used for 2.92. Written in a lucid modern English.

Final note. I am not a vet-basher. I just think that Rollins lacks a finer understanding of the human species.