Blue Gold: A Kurt Austin Adventure (A Novel from the NUMA Files, Book 2) Mass Market Paperback – May 25, 2010

The second in the NUMA series starring Kurt Austin and Joe Zavala, and it's definitely an improvement over it's predecessor. It's an interesting story with the usual Cussler megalomaniacal evil plot, this time involving a private company aiming to take over the world's fresh water supply. Have to admit the villains were the stars of this one- the main female antagonist was something I've never come close to seeing in any other novel. Enjoyed the story hereMy thoughts on Austin and Zavala remain mixed. They have zero character depth and they still come across as the "B Team" version of Dirk Pitt and Al Giordino. Hopefully Cussler can flesh them out a little in future entries

If you like Clivr Cussler's past novels on the NUMA team, you will love this book. One of Cussler's best.

I like Clive Cussler’s books but this isn’t one of my favorites. I love how he always ties the different storylines together in the end but this one stretches the imagination far beyond any he has done previously. It almost felt like a parody of the earlier NUMA books.

Second time I've read Blue Gold in a year. Just as good the second time. Great good fun read. DR

First, the good news. I liked the author’s use of the language a lot. The pacing of the story is excellent, too. A little too fast but that is fine by me.The story in the book begins with the assumption that the drinking water is becoming scarce on earth. A female scientist, Francesca Cabral, who has invented a method of producing drinking water from the sea water is kidnapped and during the course of her kidnapping, the plane she is in goes down into the Amazon jungle where she is rescued and tended to by the natives who revere her as a Goddess. In the meantime, dead whales disturb a sailing race. Among the racers are Kurt Austin and his side-kick Zavala, who work for the NUMA, short for National Underwater & Marine Agency. Thus, begins the investigation into the death of the whales to take the two undying-no-matter-what heroes after an eco-terrorist worldwide organization led by a seven-foot woman of Scandinavian origin. The ending is for the reader to find out.Truth is, I almost stopped reading this book at its beginning. This must because I am not too much into the action-adventure genre or maybe because I don’t believe Olympian type of heroes as if reflections of Zeus can exist, but what threw me off over everything else was the beginning sections of the novel. Several disjointed chapters with totally different characters was a shock. I could understand this strategy of introduction if this weren’t a novel but a movie script where producers cut from scene to scene, but this is a novel, which should take its readers into account.Granted, every chapter was exciting. The book is full of action, mostly incredible, and I could live with that…to a degree, but was it necessary to do away with Francesca at the end? Since everything edges on the unbelievable here, she could have lived, too.

OK... Clive Cussler books are not literary giants. They are not scholarly treatises nor Pulitzer Prize winning prose... what they are is FUN. I don't read his books for mind-bending concepts, but for just the opposite - an escape. My favorite past time on vacation is to relax on a lounge chair (close to a swim up bar) and devour a few of his latest treats. Although not an avid maritime historian, I certainly have always enjoyed how he has weaved true tales of the sea in with swash-buckling action. Blue Gold was both a very tasty read, as well as a very timely statement on what could very well be the next big cash crop... water. If you enjoy action and intrigue, mixed in with a good dash of our past love affair with the oceans, this is the book for you!

I just love the intertwining of scientific ideas with an adventure storythanks.look forward to the next book.sorry to have to wait.

Big time Cussler fan. (34th read). This one easily makes the top 5 so far. Good plot line with world-wide water piracy the theme and the NUMA team as the stopper as you would expect. Boat race segment was a bit of a stretch for belief, but was minor in comparison to the strong characters and great adventure woven into the rest of the tale. A tale that involved Bio-medicine exploitation, a long disappeared scientist discovered to be a living white goddess jungle queen and sinister corporate conspirators joining a 'Nordic' giantess in attempted world subjugation as sub-themes . Very enjoyable!

Blue Gold : A Novel from the NUMA files by Clive CusslerBrilliant! Another masterpiece by the master storyteller Clive Cussler.Kurt Austin and the NUMA team search the Amazon jungle and the coast of California in search of a scientific process that will benefit all mankind; but secretive powers are trying to stop them.

Good escapism adventure as usual from Mr Cussler,one big mistake though,when Francesca crashes the plane lands in mud preventing a fire,yet only a couple of chapters on all her research was lost in the fire after the crash!!!! Then near the end she hands a thick dossier that she has had no time to write of her research that has now appeared?? Come on read it back sometimes!

This is a beautifully written continuation of a great series. The plot is full of suspense and some brilliantly crafted characters, who have the courage and determination to overcome their enemies and save the world. This is a great book for anybody who love thrillers.

I used to enjoy Clive's novels, but they have not really moved on. Maybe that's what other readers like, but I found that I got about a quarter of the way through and lost interest. I'm sure that it was going to be wonderful and, you never know, I might go back and finish it.

This is a typical NUMA story with multiple threads as in his earlier books but each thread is too complicated and it becomes very difficult to retain the overall theme. Cussler and his co-authors take too long to join them together and it was only curiosity to find out how he did the join that kept me reading. In the end it was too staged. It would make two or three standalone stories rather than trying to knit them into one disjointed whole.