Book Review: Seven Deadly Wonders

Seven Deadly Wonders by Matthew Reilly
 Release Date: December 2006
Publisher: Pocket Books
Audience: Everyone
Pages: 576
Buy the Book: Amazon
Book Rating: 4/5









Okay, I guess I should state that this book doesn't fall under the category of dystopian literature, or even apocalypse literature. Well, I retract that last part. The book is about the apocalypse, but is in the tradition of those archaeological thrillers where a group, often military or paramilitary, set out to prevent Armageddon. A...'Preventapocalypse' book if you will. Ha! Worked around that loophole! Onto the review!

Seven Deadly Wonders, in a nutshell, follows Jack West Jr. and his group of scholars and soldiers as they attempt to locate the seven lost wonders of the ancient world to find and recover the golden capstone for the great pyramid at Giza. Why? Because according to an ancient sun cult, if a ritual is preformed in the capstone at a specific time and date, the nation that preforms the ritual will become the most powerful entity on the globe. However, Jack West Jr. faces opposition from other groups also seeking the capstone as countries and organizations band together to take over the world.

For a thriller, this book does very well at keeping the reader on the edge of their seat. Also, the pseudo-archaeology and alterna-history in this book is well researched and well put together. Further, Imhotep V is the ancient world's Macgyver and passed his time making ever more elaborate traps, mazes, and puzzles to foil any attempt at finding the capstone, usually killing said fortune hunters in horrible ways. Further, Reilly creates a cast of colorful and unique characters.

My main complaint about this book is the length. This book is loooong. Not that it doesn't pass quickly, but a large portion of the book is sitting down the reader in front of the author, the author explaining everything to you (even so far as giving you maps and sketches), asking you if you understand everything he explained and then, once you understand the implications of whats about to happen, lets it happen, then sits you down again and recaps the events that just happened again in case you were confused the first time around. That, and you really need to check your sense of disbelief at the door. Hidden macguffins be everywhere.

For all that, Seven Deadly Wonders is a fun read, and a bit of a guilty pleasure for me as I enjoy archaeology (so much so I have a BA in it, well, social anthropology with a emphasis therein, but you get the point). If you want a book that doesn't require heavy thinking and is well put together and deals with pyramids, the hanging gardens of Babylon, firefights, explosions etc, etc, then this is a book you certainly will enjoy. If you enjoy the slapdash archaeology of Indiana Jones, you will like this book.