As anyone who follows me knows, I spent the majority of this book yelling about Mother, a supporting character who ended up sacrificing herself for the sake of her unit's quick escape.

But she fucking managed to drag herself away, drugged and minus half a leg and LIVED ANYWAY. I AM IN LOVE.

A big lady with a shaved head, her call sign is short for motherfucker. I want an entire HBO television series about her. Hell, I wanted this book to be about her, but I suppose Shane Schofield is a good second choice. He's got the Level Four Tragic Backstory all set up with the scarred eyeballs and history of torture that men in this genre seem to require.

I was skeptical when the description of this book told me that it would "literally leave [me] gasping," but hell if this wasn't a wild ride. There is, I think, a certain level of disbelief when it comes to any thrillers, but those with unbelievable military maneuvers are to be taken in with even less attention to physics and reality. If you can't do that, then Ice Station is not for you. If you can, welcome! Shit gets hot and heavy around forty pages in and rarely allows you a second to breathe, as promised.

There's SO much death and shooting and crossbows and ALSO KILLER WHALES. It's like Matthew Reilly reached into my brain; I love those sea monsters. One of the scientists getting excited about the pod's hunting capabilities is me, full stop.

The story itself, Marines assigned to secure possible extraterrestrial technology and the shadowy oversight committee devoted to infiltrating all forward military units to be sure of the US's advantage over, well, everyone, is not particularly new. The whodunit mysery in the station and amongst Shane's unit could have been held out for longer - it would have made for a more tense and satisfying confrontation. I think there was just too much the author wanted to tell in this book after it had happened to work out that way.

The exposition gets a little clunky at times, because Reilly did his research and wants us to know it. Still, it prompted my own googling marathon and now possess far more knowledge about the Antarctic Treaty than ever before. On a related note, the investigative reporter husband-and-wife duo from the Washington Post? I could not have cared less about them; they were clearly there only as a plot device to move us forward on the layman's discovery of the aforementioned shadowy organization

(and the surprise rescue by Andrew Trent at the very end.)

. Shane (or Mother!) could hardly have done it while floating on an iceberg in the Southern Ocean, after all.

Ice Station surpasses all requirements to be labeled a "high-octane thriller" and I look forward to grabbing the sequel soon for more improbable adventures.