Bestseller Rollins's epic 12th Sigma Force adventure (after The Bone Labyrinth) features exotic locales, heroic quests, quixotic villains, action galore, and enough science and scientific curiosities to titillate even casual readers. Archeologist Harold McCabe, who has been missing for two years, suddenly emerges from the Egyptian desert near death and dies before being able to say where he has been and what has happened. McCabe's body seems to be the source of a deadly pathogen that threatens to cause a pandemic. That thread sends one team-including McCabe's daughter, Jean McCabe; bio-archaeologist Derek Rankin; and Sigma Force's operative named Seichan and Commander Grayson Pierce-to Egypt and Sudan. Meanwhile, Safia al-Maaz, a senior curator at the British Museum, is kidnapped while speaking with Sigma Force director Painter Crowe in Washington, D.C., and Painter follows that line, which leads to the Arctic and a huge installation run by billionaire Simon Hartnell. A Russian assassin, Valya Mikhailov, matches skills and wits with Seichan, while Valya's assassin twin brother, Anton, does likewise with Crowe. Rollins's characters are as large as his landscape in this vast and vastly entertaining thriller saga. Agents: Russ Galen, Scovil Galen Ghost Literary Agency; and Danny Baror, Baror International. (Dec.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

*Starred Review* The vanished leader of a British archaeological expedition appears and then dies before he can reveal where he has been and what has happened. The evidence from the professor's autopsy shows that he was mummified while still alive. Then the medical personnel who worked on his body begin to show signs of a strange disease, and so do the airport employees who handled his coffin. One of the archaeologist's friends contacts the only person she knows who can help: Painter Crowe, the director of Sigma Force. While the two are on a Skype call together, he witnesses a masked man shoot her. The professor, we learn, had been researching the biblical 10 plagues of Egypt, and Crowe and the Sigma Force team are concerned that the plagues are starting again. The intensity never lets up for a second as the narrative unfurls. When it comes to the blending of action, adventure, history, and science, there is no other author who does it better than Rollins. Fans of Clive Cussler, Steve Berry, and Michael Crichton should already have Rollins on their mandatory reading list.--Ayers, Jeff Copyright 2016 Booklist