Author: Steve Alten
Buy The Loch Amazon | Powells
"Suddenly, the water came alive wi’ salmon, must’ve been hundreds o’ them. Some were leapin’ straight oot o’ the water, a few smackin’ john right in the heid. Made me laugh, it did, but then… then the sun slid behind a cloud an’ I saw it."
Tidbit: The Loch is quite possibly the only coming together ever of William Wallace, Loch Ness, the Knights Templar, the Sargasso Sea, a squid, and Harley Davidsons.
After hearing about The Loch on Radio Go Daddy’s 7/13/05 interview with Steve Alten, I was hungry for a good history-based thriller. Similar in style to Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, be sure to start reading only if you don’t want to go anywhere for the next few hours.
Folklore & history. You don’t read a book like this
because you’re hungry for Hemingway and Shakespeare. The writing style
is straightforward and simple. Alten isn’t playing Nabokov, he’s
writing a well-paced pageturner. You’ll bounce from 14th-century
Scotland, to the modern-day Highlands, Miami’s South Beach, and even
the Sargasso Sea. You’ll delve into cryptozoology, medieval societies,
and a lot of underwater diving.
You read a book like this because you’re fascinated by how adeptly
Alten crafts together science, history, legend, and even some current
theories about what creature could in fact be in Loch Ness. You read it
because it’s a damn good story, one you cannot put down until you’ve
read through to the last page.
Side effects of reading The Loch include: a sudden
inexplicable desire to visit Scotland, especially Inverness and all the
areas around Loch Ness. You may also want to go caving, whether or not
you’ve ever wanted to before. You may want to buy a motorcycle. If you
experience any of these side effects, email me straightaway so we can
go for a beer. Trust me — I know exactly what you’ll be going through.
I haven’t read this one yet, but have been aspiring to, especially since i delved through Alten’s pulp horror books starting with Meg. Not top of the class lit by any means, but a fun story nonetheless. One that definitely increased my fears of giant shark attacks.
Great, and here I am wanting to read Meg next…
The science is part of what pulls me in. Definitely more pulp style thrillers, but he weaves through the facts with a compelling story. Gotta give props.