Overview

The time for the ultimate coup has arrived, when mankind is to be eliminated and replaced with an alien-human hybrid race. The BREEDER GRAYS, whose presence in the world has been kept a secret by their human collaborators, have diverted an immense asteroid that is hurtling toward Earth at twenty miles per second. The Everest-sized rock will strike in three days somewhere between Puerto Rico and the Yucatan Peninsula, replicating the cataclysm that brought about the end of the dinosaurs. This time it is the human race that is doomed. Only one man can keep this genocidal scheme from happening - MICHAEL KENDON. A renegade of the Directorate, a shadow-government paramilitary agency tasked with keeping the alien-human collaboration hidden from the world, Kendon must locate a powerful gravity-beam weapon that was secretly created to deflect the asteroid and the powerful energy device that it needs to work. Kendon is the sole survivor of a resistance movement started by DONALD MELLER, a nuclear scientist who created the weapon and its power source, but who did not live to see it put to use. His weapon was designed to use the same fabulous energy source that powers the alien spacecraft. The story problem is that Kendon does not know where the weapon and the power pod are located. But he knows the key to finding them is Donald Meller's daughter, LAURA MELLER. The thriller tension is enhanced by a major subplot involving Meller's secret beam weapon and its unsuspecting custodian, ERIC TEPLER, an astronomer. The weapon is hidden in the tower of a lighthouse in Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, that Donald Meller had converted into an observatory with a telescope designed to detect and track hazardous asteroids. Tepler discovers the hidden weapon after detecting an enormous asteroid that that had changed course overnight. When he first detected it, the asteroid was going to pass within four lunar distances of Earth, but now, inexplicably, it is on a collision course with Earth. Kendon and Laura, meanwhile, struggle to elude the Directorate and locate the weapon. They deduce from clues that it is in a lighthouse in southwestern Puerto Rico somewhere. They are finally able to link up with Tepler thanks to the intervention of the trustee who manages both the observatory and a trust fund Donald Meller had set up for Laura. They are arrested when attempting to steal an airplane, but they are released and given use of a jet after police find the remains of a Breeder command ship that Kendon destroyed the night before. But nothing goes smoothly, and for every step forward there are two steps backward. It is Kendon's extraordinary mind abilities that are crucial to the outcome. He learned from Donald Meller that mind is a powerful aspect of universe physics, more potent than gravity, a truth the Breeder Grays understand and use to their advantage. Kendon was more connected to the field of mindal energy than anyone Meller had ever known, and he uses his connection to defeat the Breeders as they strive against his mindal powers to keep the asteroid on target. With Tepler's help, Kendon succeeds in saving Earth but he nearly dies from a wound a Breeder commander inflicts on him in the final encounter. He survives thanks to the power of his healing ability.

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Reviews

""The author has written a suspenseful, action-packed thrill-ride that ranks with the best of the X-files...conspiracy, military SF, an intricate plot, and interesting heroes make Gray Wrath a genuine page turner!"" - Best-selling SF author Mark (James Axler) Ellis, creator of the Outlanders series. ""Vivid, fast-paced, and imaginative."" -- David Brin Gray Wrath is billed a 'thriller', but its subject and approach also lends to its attraction to sci-fi audiences interested in alien encounters and world-threatening events. The tale opens with renegade assassin Michael Kendon's incarceration and interrogation. As he faces torture by the security directorate, one of the keepers of the secrets of the Collaboration, an organization he once was committed to and a part of, he also contemplates the bigger picture involving the future of mankind. As an asteroid diverted by aliens to obliterate the human race looms in the background, Michael is the sole person who may be able to stop it-if he can overcome the attacks and restrictions from fellow human beings. Terrence Poppa employs a masterful hand at dovetailing tension and revelation throughout the course of a story that probes varying political intentions in the face of an overwhelming threat: When the sound of boots faded, Kendon leaned back against the granite wall. He could not bear to look at Meller. His tortured body was clear evidence of what the plot to defeat the Breeder agenda had come to: nothing. After all those years of secret effort and quiet hope, it was a complete failure. This is no straightforward struggle with aliens, however. Kendon's personal experiences, confrontations, and interactions also play a major role in questions of humanity's survival or demise, with issues of trust, special abilities, proactive thinking, and loyalty between killer and victim coming into play to inject satisfying thriller and psychological components into evolving events. As facedowns with snipers, massacres, and conspirators evolve, Kendon's mandate shifts in satisfyingly unexpected manners to draw readers into a story as embedded in personal confrontation as it is in alien/human struggle. Poppa's dance between thriller and sci-fi lends to a read that is exciting, unpredictable, and thoroughly engrossing. Lethal abilities combine with an adventure that blossom to incorporate healing into its milieu. The psychological tension and action blend seamlessly in a plot designed to prove gripping on more than one level. The result is a heady adventure that will reach beyond one genre to involve audiences interested in action-packed events, unexpected twists, interpersonal relationships, and considerations of what constitutes a healing journey. Libraries seeking exceptionally vivid thrillers that arrive with the added attraction of insights into redemption, survival, and recovery will find Gray Wrath a finely-tuned, top recommendation. -- Diane Donovan, senior reviewer, Midwest Book Review

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