Sam Batterman's "Maximal Reserve"

Almost two years ago, I read an extraordinary techno-thriller called Wayback by Sam Batterman. In the novel, scientists had discovered a way to return to the time immediately prior to Noah’s ark. Fast-paced, full of science and action-packed. It reminded me of the novels of the late Michael Crichton. At the time, I wondered what kind of story could Batterman write that would equal Wayback.

With Maximal Reserve, he did it.

Phil Channing is a brand new college graduate who lands a job in Texas (his girlfriend’s hometown) with Axcess Energy’s Exploration Division. He’s been taken on a tour of an exploration project off the Atlantic coast of Africa, where there’s evidence of a large oil field, but of a very different kind – a field that will prove that petroleum originates from deep within the earth. The shallowest access to the field lies under the state of – Israel. It could transform Israel into a larger oil producer than Saudi Arabia , changing the geopolitics of the Middle East and the world.

Into this potentially explosive situation is added corrupt U.S. politicians, the Russian mafia, the Syrians seeking to strike a blow against Israel, an increasingly unbalanced scientist, Israel’s secret service Mossad – and a love story. It’s a lot to manage, and the author pulls it off.

Maximal Reserve is almost breathtaking to read, moving so fast that it’s hard to put down. Batterman takes the reader on a wild ride, with lots of bodies strewn along the way, abd ends in a cliffhanger beneath the desert floor near the Dead Sea.

The novel is full of scientific detail but it doesn’t overpower the story. It also explores what’s called “abiogenic theory” of the origin of petroleum, and then moves the theory into a credible fictional rendering. The novel’s bibliography of the science and theory behind it testify to the depth of research.

Well done, Mr. Batterman. So, what’s next?

Sam Batterman's "Wayback"

I finished reading Sam Batterman's Wayback, and I've posted the review at Amazon (may take a while before it's visible, though; Amazon publishes reviews anywhere from immediately to 48 hours later). It's a great story about a "what if" -- what if the Biblical account of creation and the flood found in the book of Genesis were true -- and scientists had the means to verify it?

Batterman mixes science, action, history, a little romance -- and serves up one powerful story.

What impressed me the most, though, was his ability to describe settings -- the landscape. I was in that control center where the scientists have congregated. I was seeing the antedeluvian world for the first time, feeling and inhaling the water-saturated atmosphere and shocked, like the characters, at seeing herds of dinosaurs. I was walking the streets of Jersualem right before the Six-Day Way begins in 1967. I was running with the crew down the streets and into the sewer of the ancient city that doesn't know it's doomed. The detail is amazing, representing some exhaustive research. In the case of the antedeluvian world, the descriptions and detail are speculative but no less real.

Batterman, in his first novel, is clearly a master of setting of the scene.

Going "Wayback"

Thirty years ago, I went through a science fiction phase in my reading. I believe it started with Frank Herbert's Dune series; by the time the phase ended, I had devoured Robert Heinlein, Robert Silverberg, Arthur Clarke, Orson Scott Card, Ben Bova and scores of others, all of them great storytellers. Previously, the closest I had come to science fiction was Michael Crichton -- The Andromeda Strain, Terminal Man, other best sellers, and then the mega-hit (and mega-movie) Jurassic Park.

There was a gap for me between Terminal Man and Jurassic Park -- I was on to other genres. But what always impressed me about Crichton was his ability to embrace science in his novels, and make the speculative totally believable.

I'm almost finished the novel Wayback by Sam Batterman, and I may have found another Michael Crichton.

Wayback is about an idea -- the idea that scientists have figured out a way to travel back in time, and a team goes to a time shortly before the Great Flood of Genesis. The scientists on the team represent the gamut of belief -- from ardent Christians to atheists. They don't know that Middle Eastern terrorists are right behind them, terrorists who are not interested in scientific knowledge but something sinister.

It sounds implausible. It sounds like believability will be a problem. But you start reading the novel and wham!, it's got you. Sam Batterman has that same ability to utilize science and speculative science that Michael Crichton had. The breadth of the research he's undertaken for the novel is extraordinary. And the novel does what good speculative novels have to do -- suck you into the story and move fast. You find yourself exploring the world of Noah with all the wonder of the novel's fictional scientific team.

I'll have a more in-depth review, but I can say right now that Wayback is a terrific, and thought-provoking, read.