THE BINISPHERE

An SF tale for the nuclear age that draws on a real-life tale of abduction.

Back in 1938, just before the start of World War II, Italian nuclear physicist Ettore Majorana disappears off the face of the Earth. No one knows what’s happened to him, except for a chosen few: a select group of scientists and powerful Mafia and Vatican figures who come together as part of a mysterious scientific operation—one that will take decades to come to fruition. Majorana’s ideas are, after all, years ahead of the technology of his own time. In the present-day United States, the CIA recalls Perry Franklin, a retired agency researcher with a troubled past and a penchant for developing new tech, to investigate strange occurrences happening off the coast of Sicily. His covert mission takes him to a small, charming village with friendly inhabitants, where Perry hopes to solve the longstanding Majorana mystery; there, he meets a standoffish local woman, Christina LaTorre, to whom he has an undeniable attraction. As Perry and Christina’s relationship develops, secrets are revealed that could either lead to the salvation of the destruction of the world. Black-ops action, political shenanigans, nuclear science, tragedy, and romance mesh in a tale that takes the mysterious disappearance of Majorana, an actual figure from history, and reimagines it. The result, however, is an unevenly executed thriller that doesn’t live up to its promising setup. The science is dry and sometimes unnecessarily dense, the action sequences perfunctory, and the perspective hops haphazardly from character to character. Still, there are moments that sincerely highlight heartwarming aspects of Sicilian culture and its endearing locals. Although Christina is a strong, empowered character who holds her own against the men in her orbit, the treatment of other female characters feels strangely dated at times.

A thriller with an intriguing setup but flawed execution.