AustLit

'At an abandoned Soviet base in the Arctic, the battle to save the world has begun...

The Secret Base
'It is a top-secret base known only as Dragon Island. A long-forgotten relic of the Cold War, it houses a weapon of terrible destructive force, a weapon that has just been re-activated...

A Renegade Army
'When Dragon Island is seized by a brutal terrorist force calling itself the Army of Thieves, the fate of the world hangs in the balance, and there are no crack units close enough to get there in time to stop the Army setting off the weapon.

One Small Team
'Except, that is, for a small equipment-testing team up in the Arctic led by a Marine captain named Schofield, call-sign SCARECROW. It's not a strike force; just a handful of Marines and civilians. It's not equipped to attack a fortified island held by a vicious army. But Scarecrow will lead the team in anyway, because someone has to.

'The ultimate hero is back, facing the ultimate army of villains.' (From the publisher's website.)

'The end of the world is here...

'Unlocking the secret of the Seven Ancient Wonders was only the beginning.

'The world is in mortal danger.

'For Jack West Jr and his loyal team of heroes, the challenge now is to set six legendary diamonds known as the Pillars in place at six ancient sites around the world before the deadline for global destruction arrives. The locations of these sites, however, can only be revealed by the fabled Six Sacred Stones.

'Their quest will involve the death-defying hijack of a mountaintop railway in China... A midnight expedition to Stonehenge... A headlong chase across the deserts of Egypt... And a trek into the dark realm of an African tribe forgotten by time...

'With only the riddles of ancient writers to guide them, and time rapidly running out, Jack and his team must fight their way past traps, labyrinths and a host of deadly enemies - knowing that this time they cannot, will not, must not fail.

'The mission is incredible. The consequence of failure is unimaginable. The ending is unthinkable.' (Publisher's blurb)

Distress is 'set in 2055 when the centre of Sydney is virtually deserted, as most work and entertainment is conducted at home via broadband optical fibre networks. Egan's main character, science journalist Andrew Worth, is sent to 'Stateless', a bioengineered Pacific coral island to interview a South African Nobel Prize winner who is intending to reveal a major breakthrough in human comprehension techniques. Various competing interests, however, descend on the island and Worth becomes an unwitting agent of change. Biotechnology implants, quantum physics, voluntary autism and mutant cholera are just some of the ingredients mixed into the mystery of who wishes to kill the Nobel Laureate, and for what purpose' (Colin Steele, SF Commentary No 77, p.54).