Book Review: Maximal Reserve by Sam Batterman

Well, Thanks to the whole Blogger 22 hour down/erased scheduled posts, I am having to rewrite this post, so sorry if you actually read it before!

Synopsis:  Petroleum exploration engineer Phil Channing uncovers the single largest oil reserve in history--and he's only been employed for a week! The find is so large that it dwarfs all Middle East reserves combined, and lies so deep within the bowels of the earth that it can't be reached by any conventional method. He discovers how to tap into this Maximal Reserve through research left behind by a college friend who was brutally murdered just before Phil took the job. The secret lies in the cryptic revelation of a complex of lava tubes on the southeast side of the Dead Sea known as Etsba Elohim--the Finger of God. This knowledge provides the ability to reach this incredibly strategic resource and threatens to change the world's balance of power and wealth in favor of the small nation of Israel.

You can read an excerpt on the author's website!

About the Author: Sam Batterman grew up in the 1980s with a pocketful of quarters to play Defender and Asteroids in one hand, and a stack of computer magazines in the other. After four years of teaching himself computer programming, and being accused of being a nerd, he decided to make it official, and traveled to Greenville, South Carolina to get a Computer Science degree from Bob Jones University. After working for a pharmaceutical giant just outside of Philadelphia for eight years, he finally achieved his high school dream of working for Microsoft as a software engineer (where he still works). 

Sam lives with wife, Susan, and their two kids, in Southeastern Pennsylvania. He periodically teaches Computer Programming at a Christian school, and enjoys seeing kids get excited about the technology that he loves so much. Being a huge fan of Michael Crichton, Robert Ludlum and Tom Clancy he decided to try his hand at fiction, a secret desire since high school. Sam and his wife serve at Valley Forge Baptist Temple in Collegeville, PA. Check out his blog and website too! And check out the Facebook fan site, for his first book in the series, Wayback!

Review:Ah, the Sophomore books in series! You guys know how I like them! I was lucky to discover this one through Mama Bzz and am very happy I got to read it! 

This is a very quick read and if you like suspense, mystery, conspiracy, historical based books with some romance thrown in, you'll love this book! It reminded my alot of a religious based tv crime show- it had all the characters that you typically find, had the crime scenes (including some detailed crime scenes that might be a little much for some people), a crime that lead to a mystery and then back again, I could really see it as a mini-series on the Ion channel! 

As it includes oil companies, the bane and employer of many Louisianans, made it even more interesting! The topic of never ending oil is one that we can all relate to right now with gas at an all time high of almost $4 a gallon (which by the way really galls us in LA., as we pay excess taxes on it, even though it comes off our shores.SIGH, thanks those in Baton Rouge getting the kickbacks...) , and the conspiracy theory was NOT overdone. I will be looking for the first book in this series for sure! I highly recommend this book as a breath of fresh air in the mystery/suspense realm!

And don't worry about it not being a giveaway right now- after a couple of friends read it, it will be up on the Top Shelf for giveaway!

In the meantime, if you want a ebook of it, it's available on Kindle through Amazon!

Disclosure / Disclaimer: I received this books for review purposes on this blog, free of charge, from the author, via Bring It On Communications (and Mama Bzz) .No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told what to say about the book!