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A near-disaster at a nuclear plant causes the government to renovate a top-secret nuclear-waste-storage facility deep inside a mountain in New Mexico. A group of influential officials is given a tour of Hydra Mountain, and, while they are impressed by the state-of-the-art security protocols, they remain concerned about the sheer amount of materials kept inside. The crash of a small plane at a nearby air base triggers a lockdown, and the tour members, including Department of Energy official Adonia, must outthink the defense mechanisms in place. Unfortunately, that means diving deeper into the mountain to find a way to escape. Anderson and Beason are masters at creating a tension-filled thriller overlaid with fascinating science. Readers who love the mixture of adventure and science found in the work of James Rollins and Michael Crichton will find the latest from this talented pair of authors to be right up their alley.--Jeff Ayers Copyright 2019 Booklist

Publishers Weekly
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Anderson and Beason (Lifeline) fail to do justice to the intriguing setup of this muddled action thriller. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy Stanley van Dyckman, a sycophantic Washington, D.C., bureaucrat, organizes a review of the nation's newest nuclear waste facility, Hydra Mountain, outside Albuquerque, N.Mex. The team van Dyckman assembles includes attractive Adonia Rojas, the nuclear site manager, who serves as the group's brains and moral compass; Col. Shawn Whalen, Adonia's former boyfriend and the U.S. president's military aide, who supplies the brawn; and U.S. Senator Pulaski, the total fool who's in charge of the Hydra project's purse strings. Soon after Adonia and company start their tour, a small plane has a problem that causes it to land just inside the facility fence. The protocols for dealing with the breach lead inadvertently to a lockdown. Adonia and the others face increasing peril as they seek to escape the mountain. Stock characters make it difficult for readers to care much about their fate. Other writers have done a better job of dramatizing the risks of a potential nuclear disaster on American soil. Agent: John Silbersack, Bent Agency. (Aug.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.