got distracted by other books and this one just really didn't grab me. I'm probably not the intended audience but I didn't find this protagonist compelling at all. Might try again at some point.

I read this back in high school (as well as the second book in this series) and decided to give it a revisit after seeing the ebook on Libby. There's a lot to like here - Cussler evokes the time period fairly well, with detailed descriptions of period technology and settings, but the characters (especially the protagonist) are just so. flat. and boring. Isaac Bell is an insufferable Gary Stu.

This book was assigned in one of my undergrad classes. I decided to revisit it years later and while I enjoyed a lot of it, I struggled to keep focused on it this time around. Good book, just not the book I needed at the time.