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Johann Wolff, a German scientist and émigré, resettles in a Midwestern university town after World War II, and within months he mysteriously disappears. A half century later, Ted Sandstrom, an experimental physicist, announces to a small audience of his fellow scientists that he has discovered a method for generating vast amounts of power with a small quantum energy device. The scientists include Nolan Kilkenny, a former Navy Seal who will transfer Ted's research into the industrialized sector, and Oksanna Zoschenko, a Ukranian physicist who understands that Sandstrom's work has vast implications for the global economy as well as the future of science. The connection between Sandstrom and Wolff is at the heart of this suspense thriller; Wolff's missing notebooks not only presage Sandstrom's research, but also hold the key to utilizing it to change the world. Meanwhile, Victor Orlov, a powerful Russian industrialist, sends his own private army of killers to steal Sandstrom's work and turn it over to his own scientists to create a vast new industry that will destabilize the economic and geopolitical balance. Orlov's only obstacle is Kilkenny (from Spyder Web), who makes a welcome appearance in Quantum. He's a hero in the Tom Clancy tradition, a one-man army. The sometimes plodding story will appeal primarily to readers with enough scientific knowledge to understand the complicated physics of Wolff's and Sandstrom's work and a compelling interest in how new technology impacts the world economy. --Jane Adams
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