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SAVING CASCADIA
John J. Nance
Simon & Schuster, Mar 2005, $25.00, 320 pp.
ISBN: 0743250516
US Geological Survey seismologist Doug Lam is positive that the Washington state barrier island Cascadia is on the verge of an earthquake. Still Chadwick and Noble company approved construction of Mick Walker's posh casino-hotel and convention center on the island. Feeling remorse and guilt, company engineer Diane Lacombe possesses proof that her company knew about the dangerous deadly potential of building on the fault line. However, before she can do anything with her evidence, Diane is forced to flee the Seattle area as someone wants the CD with its proof and her silenced.

The quakes begin with the first tremor centered on the ocean floor but close enough to the coast to feel it in Puget Sound. The first major quake hammers coastal Bellingham, but help is impeded due to a thick fog. Next Cascadia Island shakes with a ferry containing a hundred guests on the way to the new facility sinking and the new hotel collapsing. Cascadia Island seems destined to become a twenty-first century Krakatoa sinking beneath the ocean while a deadly tsunami is heading to destroy much of the state potentially killing millions.

The tragedy in Asia provides a stark reality to John J. Nance’s action tale that with each concentric widening circle gets more and more pulse pumping. The story line is action-packed with heroes, victims, and culprits who only care to bury the truth in the rubble. Because of the recent Asiatic devastation, SAVING CASCADIA is more than just a disaster thriller as Mr. Nance makes the case that what happened in the Indian Ocean rim could occur here. This scary terrific thriller should raise alarms in that other Washington.

Harriet Klausner


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