Sabre

A fast-paced, witty and thrilling sci-fi technothriller which would make a top movie! The story was written in 1997 and is set in 2021 and details an Anglo-French spaceplane project designed to revolutionise air travel. However, the American air industry, entering a recession, is not happy and a group of extremists decide to hatch a plot to smuggle a bomb on board and discredit the Sabre for good. Add to this a subplot of an oil-drilling concern working in Australia who are unwittingly drawn into the bomb plot and you have more twists along the way. The space sequences are excellent and very feasible and well-researched, there are brilliant flashes of imagination where future technology is concerned which in some cases have come true -Memcorders, which are camcorders which record on to a small memory card(has he predicted digital cameras here or video messaging?!); digital memopads(PDAs!), networked computer gaming and HEATHROW TERMINAL SIX?! You never know one day . . .), yet traffic on the M25 motorway, even in 2021 is still a big problem! Add to all this the subplot of Jez, a teenage spaceplane freak who wins a TV competition to fly to Australia on the Sabre and who unwittingly becomes the hero of the day and you have a winning novel! All in all, a highly recommended read. Fans of American writers Dale Brown and Clive Cussler will enjoy this, but it will also appeal to the sci-fi fraternity in its visionary output of a possible future. Highly recommended