Dark Watch, by Clive Cussler

I still don't understand the appeal of Clive Cussler (or his co-writers who are probably writing most of his books these days). There's plenty of action, but it's boring and tedious because the characters aren't well developed. It's odd. Even though we get background on the captain and learn some of his motivation, I still didn't care about him.

But perhaps what turned me off most in Dark Watch was that the bad guys plan was to corner the market on gold so they could mess with the world monetary supply (or something). But this is completely ridiculous because the world hasn't been on a gold standard since 1974! Once I'd read that, I lost all confidence in the authors and it made it difficult to continue.

I only made it about half way through, and it didn't get any better. I suppose this just isn't my type of fiction. But there are plenty of people who do enjoy it, and that's cool.