THE COLOR OF GREED

An adventure sequel focuses on a geologist in post–climate change Antarctica.

Westhoff begins this installment of his Erebus Tales series a year after its predecessor, Stone Fever(2016), left off. A 24th-century geologist named Keltyn SparrowHawk, wounded and stranded while on a mission to Antarctica’s forbidding Mount Erebus, has been taken in by the nomadic Onwei tribe. Keltyn has spent time healing and growing close with several members of her new people. Unfortunately, the evil, greedy outside world, here epitomized by scheming industrialist Oscar Bailey, still has designs on the precious iridium buried in Mount Erebus. While dealing with domestic challenges posed in part by a splinter group aiming to hamstring his enterprise, Bailey outfits a new expedition to Antarctica, this one spearheaded by a scene-stealing character named Helmut Gans and Keltyn’s former mentor, Russell McCoy. This mission places Keltyn and her tribe directly on the perilous path of confronting the world’s most powerful man. The story that unfolds takes in a far wider range of adventures than the first book, from savage combat between newly modified prehistoric animals to equally ferocious conflicts between tribal factions. Westhoff writes all of this with an engaging enthusiasm that almost always compensates for a tendency toward leaden prose. This is an author who could benefit greatly from not underestimating his readers, something he repeatedly does, usually to the detriment of his narrative. When an older character summons a young man to deliver a message, for example, readers are told that his breath smelled of rotgut whiskey as he tells the man: “That old hag Yoka wishes to see you. It is important.” To which the author adds: “He emphasized ‘por’ with a sneer.” But readers have already seen the italics, and they can intuit the sneer. Still, the audience will nevertheless enjoy plenty of thrills in this rousing story as the pages turn.

An exciting, high-stakes futuristic tale.