Frank Carlson Library

When Dirk Pitt is nearly killed rescuing an oil survey team from a freak wave on Russia's Lake Baikal, it appears a simple act of nature. But when the survey team is abducted and Pitt's research vessel nearly sunk, it's obvious there's something more sinister involved.

Due to a shuttle's unfortunate demise in outer space, NASA becomes aware of a doomsday asteroid that is on a collision course with Earth. It seems that the only way to knock it off course is to drill into its surface and detonate a nuclear weapon. But as NASA's under-funded yet resourceful team train the world's best drillers for the job, the social order of the world begins to break down as the information reaches the public and hysteria results....

There is less oil than the world requires, and that will make some people rich and others dead. Career CIA field operative Bob Barnes is sorting out his midcareer issues--his bosses want him quietly confined to a desk job. Bryan Woodman, an expatriate in Geneva, becomes the financial adviser to idealistic Gulf Prince Nasir. Corporate lawyer Bennett Holiday is finessing the questionable merger of two powerful U.S. oil companies. In Prince Nasir's country,...