From this popular team comes another solid thriller.

Billionaire Palmer Lloyd's hobby is buying up rare artifacts; the current object of his desire is the world's largest meteorite, buried on an island off the coast of Chile. Eli Glinn is the head of the high-tech engineering firm Palmer hires to figure out a way to bring the meteorite home to the U.S. Sam McFarlane is the down-and-out meteorite hunter, the expert whose own theory about the origins of the meteorite, if proven to be true, could spell disaster for everyone involved.

It is no accident that this fits the description of a big-budget feature film. After all, Preston and Child have a history of writing novels that read like movies in prose form, with exciting stories, plenty of interesting characters (here we also have a boat captain who's a recovering alcoholic), and visually arresting set pieces.

Most of the novel's action takes place either on Rolvaag, a huge tanker rebuilt to carry the enormous meteorite, or on Isla Desolacion, where Palmer's group tries to uncover, and move, the meteorite without losing too many lives in the process; both locations are perfect for the big screen. The characterizations here are rather deeper than those found in most of the team's previous thrillers--the players are more like people and less like stick figures--but, as always, the action is what keeps readers turning the pages.

The authors' fans will appreciate their new novel, as will fans of such writers as Michael Crichton and Clive Cussler.