Treasure

How do you connect a plane crash based on two overlapping terrorist plots, hidden mob-like family, a Mexican revolution based on bringing back the might of the Aztec empire, an Egyptian revolution based on fundamental Islam, a Roman ship far from where any Roman ship has any right to be, and the lost Library of Alexandria?

Carefully. Very very carefully.

Or you can read [b:Treasure|85737|Treasure (Dirk Pitt, #9)|Clive Cussler|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1314486012l/85737._SY75_.jpg|3041094] and find out. As you might guess, it's an absolutely ridiculous book, but at this point, that's pretty much Clive Cussler/Dirk Pitt in a nutshell. Don't read it expecting to make overly much sense. Read it show more because it's a rollicking adventure novel with a sprinkling of archaeology.

I think the biggest negative of the book is that there are really two plotlines--the treasure and the revolutions--and they only barely interact with each other. It's not a deal breaker, but it is unfortunate.

A fun listen though, still worth it. show less

"Treasure" has everything you could want from a Dirk Pitt novel, the mix or locations, action, and a wonderful last scene, there's just so much plot! I've seen people describe these books as shallow and unrealistic, but if you want realism, look out of the window, not in a Clive Cussler book. Fantastic adventure, keep them coming.

This is only the second Clive Cussler book I’ve ever read and to be honest I didn’t really enjoy the first one but a friend recommended this one and I thought I would give it a go …. I certainly thought it was better.
It is another Dirk Pitt story, the bucaneering and wise-cracking protagonist of a series of adventure packed thrillers and this book was certainly action-packed! Together with his wise cracking, comic sidekick Al Giordino they travel from Greenland to the tip of the Southern Americas foiling various plans to; stop Middle Eastern terrorists gaining control of the Egyptian government, to kill the leader of the UN, a world wide criminal families plans to gain control of Mexico and storm the borders to America and also show more discover the lost treasures (the ‘treasure’ of the title) from the library of Alexandria … and all in time to get back to wine and dine the alluring female scientist helping them … *phew*!
The story is fast paced with a lot happening to each character all around the world in a very short period of time which does make it rather an addictive page turner but ultimately by the end I thought the story was flagging, there just seemed to be too much going on, there were a lot of ideas and I think it might have been better to have concentrated on just one or two. I enjoyed the search for the lost treasure and also the idea of a criminal family trying to mastermind their way to positions of power and ultimately control of various countries but combine them together with various assisantion plots, a stolen ship full of kidnapped government officials and some cardboard characters (there seemed no time to introduce or describe the characters fully) and towards the end I was struggling a bit to finish it. show less

Dirk Pitt, ancient artifact discoverer extraordinaire is searching an ancient deepsea wreck for info about the Library of Alexandria when he finds himself drawn into a terrorist plot set on international unrest and upheaval in Egypt and Mexico. He picks up several love interests along the way and with his trusty band of sidekicks, goes toe to toe with a madman.

I won’t deny that the story was entertaining but it could have been so much better. If Cussler had made the characters believable and if the plot had less of a James Bond scope I would have enjoyed it more. There are action scenes of literally every type. There’s an airplane crash, a shipwreck explored, a car chase down a mountain, a battle in an air hanger, men scaling a show more mountain and climbing on board a ship. I find it difficult to believe that a man in the business of salvaging ancient antiquities would get involved in such zaniness. To be fair Indiana Jones did the same thing but for some reason it feels more believable taking place in the late 30s with Nazis coming out of the woodwork and fewer regulations on ancient sites and artifacts. Having the book take place in present day (1989) I expect more. Overall I would classify the book as a beach read, something to take on vacation if you don’t want to think too hard.

Dirk Pitt is super annoying as a protagonist because he's described as 'practically perfect in every way'. He's tall, handsome, smart, athletic and gets all the ladies. There were so many instances when the way he was described made him seem cartoonish because of how unbelievable it was. For example his eyes are described in a ridiculous manner. "They seemed to reflect hardness, gentleness and sincere concern in one glinting montage." How can eyes both reflect hardness and gentleness? It’s an impossibility! We are also led to believe that his piercing gaze makes women weak in the knees. The book is a harlequin romance written by a man with a protagonist so unrealistic it ruined the book and every other Dirk Pitt story for me. On that note I do have one more Clive Cussler/Dirk Pitt book in my library called ”Inca Gold” that I am very tempted to read and then dispose of. I don’t think it’s too much to ask that readers are treated with a degree of intelligence by the author and I felt that while the story contained political intrigue, the story itself was dumbed down.

The sad part is I only picked up this book because it mentioned discovering the lost Library of Alexandria on the dust jacket. The problem is the Library is in fact, a Macguffin. The reader is lulled into thinking the story will be about bringing back the literary treasures of the past but the library storyline soon fades into the background only to reemerge at the very end of the book. It felt as if Cussler smushed together two different books. We start with the Library but a large portion of the book is taken up with international terrorists.

The strange thing is I own ”Sahara”, a Dirk Pitt movie based on a book of the same name. It’s actually pretty decent. Good action, characters and plot. I’ll have to revisit it and review it on here to contrast how Dirk Pitt can be handled well as a character. If you’re looking for something to read on the plane that’s action oriented but not too deep, pick up this book. show less

It is another Dirk Pitt story, the bucaneering and wise-cracking protagonist. Plot starts with a Egyptian/Roman discovery in Greenland, through a ship hijacking in the South Atlantic, to a mass migration incited by a mad man into Texas. Pretty exciting. The usual characters portray, but the Admiral Sandecker seems to have a more prominent role than usual. Great history lesson, too. But CC got some things inaccurately displayed.

A late Roman ship locked in Greenland ice changes history, but a wax tablet describing its journey could bring the treasures of the Library of Alexandria back to the world. Treasure is the 9th book of Clive Cussler’s Dirk Pitt series as the titular hero goes from searching for a sunken Soviet sub to searching for a missing cruise ship with foreign heads of state and then looking for the fabulous remnants of the Library of Alexandria in Texas near the Rio Grande.

The last head of the Library of Alexandria finishes his inventory of the treasures he’s taken to be preserved in an unknown land only for his mercenaries to anger the local barbarians that attack and kill nearly everyone, except for the librarian and one ship that didn’t show more trust him cast off leaving him behind. Almost 1500 years later, archaeologist Dr. Lily Sharp finds a Roman coin in Eskimo village in Greenland while off the coast Dirk Pitt and Al Giordino help the U.S. Navy find a sunken Soviet sub when suddenly a commercial airliner with the UN Secretary General onboard flies overhead and crash lanes into the ice. The archaeologists, Pitt & Giordino, and the Navy personal launch rescues but find three survivors with most dead by poison but the 1st and 2nd officers killed by the missing pilot, one of the best assassins in the world. Using the equipment on the Navy ship, Pitt finds a late Roman vessel trapped in the ice with the crew preserved along with a log of the ship’s journey and why they were there. But Pitt, Giordino, and Dr. Sharp are sent to Colorado to talk with a Library of Alexandria expert and end up in a car chase after rescuing the UN Secretary General Hala Kamil from another assassination attempt, though an inept one, wanted by an Islamic cleric in her native Egypt because of her popularity. The Egyptian cleric, in an alliance with a Aztec religious fanatic in Mexico, orders his expert assassin to abduct the Presidents of Egypt and Mexico from their cruise ship at a Third World economic conference in Uruguay. The addition of Kamil who wanted to confer with both Presidents and Senator George Pitt, Dirk’s father, which the expert assassin views as both finishing his airplane job and leverage against the United States in the search. Pitt, Giordino, and Rudy Gunn takeover a NUMA ship in the south Atlantic and figure out that instead of sinking the cruise liner, a Mexican freighter was sunk and the cruiser made to look like the freighter for the benefit of satellites then wrapped in plastic that was covered in water so as to look like an iceberg to hide in the Strait of Magellan. U.S. Special Forces raid the ship, killing the Mexican terrorists who had secretly left with the VIP hostages to an old mining operation on a nearby island that the NUMA people were left only to be defeated by Pitt and others barely though the hostages saved. The expert assassin, blinded thanks to Pitt, wanting revenge kills the Egyptian cleric for setting him up for failure while he sends his deputy to kill Pitt. The NUMA computer using a map outline from the Roman ship and the journey log’s description locates the landing spot in Rome, Texas near the Mexican border. The Aztec religious fanatic inspires the poor citizenry of Mexico to gather at the border then invade the town of Rome only to be confronted by Pitt at the dig site then killed along the deputy assassin in a three-way fight before an explosion supposedly destroys the treasure and sending disappointed Mexicans back across the border. It is revealed that treasure was buried in another of the seven hills around the Texas town and that the Egyptian and Mexican religious fanatics were brothers from mixed race marriage of a three generation old crime family with tentacles around the world along with another brother who was being groomed to takeover Brazil.

Cussler takes a cue from era of the book’s publication, late 80s, and eliminates the Cold War cliché subplots instead going for Third World populism as well as religious fanaticism subplots that worked better from a story standpoint, yet the White House political and policy scenes felt like a drag to the story as a whole. If anything the Library of Alexandria element was probably the weakest subplot since beginning with Julius Caesar’s accidental partial destruction of the Library nothing from the original was left by the time Cussler’s “last librarian” buried the treasure in Texas and Alexander the Great’s mummy had probably been moved to an Alexandrian church under the false belief it was the Apostle Mark—and is probably in St. Mark’s in Venice if it was smuggled out by merchants centuries after the Muslims took over. As for the characters, the main antagonist was the expert assassin who was very formidable and almost got Pitt killed from the grave while the two religious fanatics were the typical “evil overlords” who were more secondary villains than anything else. Pitt was an over-the-top ladies’ man, having sex with both Kamil and Sharp, but got beaten up with all the fighting done over the course of the novel. However just because they had sex with Pitt doesn’t mean Kamil and Sharp weren’t interesting characters and showed an improvement of Cussler’s writing.

Treasure improved in areas over the previous Pitt installment through went back in another, but it’s overall quality was on par with Cyclops and the overall story was better. This a great adventure story with everything from treasure, assassins, political intrigue, and daring feats which is well worth your time if you’re interested in a light read over a few days. show less

One of my favourite Pitt novels.

When the great Library of Alexandria was ordered sacked in A.D. 391, could some of its fabulous art treasures and volumes from its magnificent library have escaped the flames and been ferried across the Atlantic? You might say it is highly improbable - but if Clive Cussler has any say, and he does in this adventure, it is also highly likely.

No one picks up a Dirk Pitt novel expecting great literature, but to enjoy a wild adventurous ride. This has all of the elements fans love in Custler's Dirk Pitt novels, including the "car".