Sam Reilly

In the Pacific Ocean, a Silicon Valley magnate vacationing on his luxury motor yacht Carpe Diem, stumbles across a floating island of pumice. Two weeks later, the motor yacht returns to its home port in San Diego on autopilot – but when it arrives, nobody disembarks. Sam Reilly and his team are called in to investigate what happened on board Carpe Diem. But what at first appears to be a simple boating accident soon turns into a deadly game of international intrigue – sending America and Russia racing toward each other on an unavoidable collision course.

On March 11, 2011, the Japanese fishing trawler, Hoshi Maru accidentally hauled up something deadly into its live-fish hold. The crew, having discovered their mistake, raced toward the harbor in the hope that they might survive. They never made it. Presumed sunk by the tsunami that ravaged the coastline of Japan, its crew were declared dead. Seven years later, the shipwreck washed up on Cannon Beach, Oregon. By the time the US Department of Fish and Wildlife arrived to investigate, people in the nearby towns had started to die in terrifying and inexplicable ways.

In the dead of night, a decrepit, unmarked motor yacht drifts into the medieval port of Vernazza, Italy. The run-down vessel forms a jarring contrast to the pastel colored tower homes and terraced vineyards surrounding the natural harbor along the coast of Cinque Terre. Less than fifty yards away, a man wakes up on board a small rowboat, covered in blood. Lying next to him is a woman with two – execution style – bullet holes to her forehead. In his right hand he holds a small suitcase. Tucked into his pocket is a Russian built Makarov semiautomatic handgun – with two rounds missing.

A city cloaked in a legend too dangerous to be true. An ancient tribe, who has vowed to protect their gods until the end of time. A shipwreck scattered with gold, and drawings of a mythical beast. Sam Reilly is on the hunt to find an ancient tomb, before the secret of El Dorado is lost forever…

Fifteen years ago, 8-year-old Ethan Jones watched a stranger bury something in the mining ruins of the Rhyolite Desert, Nevada. Even at his young age, he knew what he’d just seen was important. In present day, a US Navy SEAL takes refuge in a secret chamber beneath the ancient streets of Syria and discovers an unusual stone artifact, like nothing he’d ever seen before. When news of the discovery reaches Sam Reilly, he is forced to return to his past, where his search for the Master Builders originated – and complete a mission he’d hoped could have stayed unfinished forever.

In A.D. 79, Mount Vesuvius erupted and a small girl raced for her life along the cobblestone streets of Pompeii. She needed to survive. She needed to tell someone what she had done so that it could never happen again… In present day, while Sam Reilly is on a mission to locate the long-lost shipwreck of legendary explorer Ernest Shackleton, a strange code begins to circulate on the internet. It purports to have the answers to some of the world’s most complex engineering and algorithmic problems.

Shangri-La. For generations, few people have known whether that mythical paradise was real or just a legend. But now, a clandestine assembly between some of the most powerful organizations on the planet has been called, and Sam Reilly must disentangle the truth from the myth. And there are dangerous people who will go to any length to keep Shangri-La’s secrets buried.

Alexander the Great was one of the most successful military leaders of all time, conquering vast realms from Syria, to Persia, and as far east as Taxila, India. In the process, he stripped his enemies of their immense riches. By the time of his death, he had accumulated the greatest wealth on Earth. Legend has it, fearing assassination, Alexander had his gold minted into Gold Staters, coins bearing his likeness, before having his most trusted men transport them to a secret location. Now Sam and Tom are on the hunt to find it, and there is much more at stake than mere wealth...

In AD 980 a Viking fleet, banished from their native Greenland, sailed west across a savage and icy sea. After making the perilous journey, they found a world abounding with lush meadows, rivers teeming with salmon, and wild grapes so suitable for wine that they called the region Vinland. But there was something else they discovered. They weren’t the first Europeans to make the treacherous journey.

In 1829 the Spanish slave ship, Midas, left Mendiland (modern-day Sierra Leone) headed for the Americas. During the Atlantic crossing, the slaves revolted, taking control of the ship. Midas became a pirate vessel, attacking Spanish slavers and merchants alike. In the present day, while hunting for the Midas, Sam Reilly learns of an escalating number of mysterious deaths, superstitiously whispered to be the fault of Medusa’s Curse, and the only clue to stopping it is deciphering a Greek myth thousands of years in the making.

In 1974, local farmers outside Xi'an, China, discovered an army of more than 8,000 life-sized ancient terracotta warriors buried in a series of pits. Historians believed that the warriors were placed there to guard the mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China. The historians were wrong. The Terracotta Army was there to prevent the evil buried within from ever surfacing again. Now Sam Reilly must disentangle fact from fiction, and discover what ancient danger has been uncovered…and if there is any way to stop it.

In East Antarctica, a team of scientists drilled a hole in the Vostok ice sheet to take a sample of the subterranean lake 2.2 miles below the surface. It was the deepest drill ever performed through ice anywhere in the world.

Maritime salvage expert Sam Reilly is flown in to find out what went wrong, and how to re-float the ocean-going behemoth. Something about the accident just doesn’t seem right…. In Sudan, a team of archaeologists exploring the ancient tombs buried within the Pyramids of Meroë discover one of the greatest archaeological hauls since King Tutankhamun’s tomb was uncovered in the Valley of the Kings.

A group of cave divers exploring the deepest recess of a previously unexplored section of the Chevé Cave Mexico—one of the deepest caves on Earth—sent a message up from the bottom of the flooded cave, via a sealed bottle that floated to the surface.

During Operation Desert Storm, Major William Harrison led a team of Special Forces on a secret mission to capture Haidar Kamel, a ruthless arms dealer. The operation revealed a treasure trove of dangerous weapons, along with a series of strange artifacts from the ancient world. One of the most unlikely discoveries was a small bronze medallion. They named it the Medallion of Petra, and somehow, it was much more dangerous and valuable than anyone could have ever imagined…

A private jet crashes in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, killing everyone on board. One of the passengers was Darren Young, an entomologist who was meant to be working alone in Papua New Guinea, studying rare beetles. So why was he on a private jet on the other side of the world? And why, as his plane entered its fatal descent, did he send a text message to his wife containing just three simple words: “FIND SAM REILLY!”

Kelly Robinson, a 24-year-old economics doctoral student, spent the day on a perilous climb to Abuna Yemata Guh, a 5th-century monolithic church carved into a sheer cliffside in Ethiopia. Inside, the chapel walls were covered with vibrant frescoes, their colors deep and rich, depicting serene biblical figures, saints, and angels. But then something happened that science couldn’t explain.