We are not alone… In a cave in the Himalayas, a guide discovers a self-mutilated body with the warning--Satan exists. In the Kalahari Desert, a nun unearths evidence of a proto-human species and a deity called Older-than-Old. In Bosnia, something has been feeding upon the dead in a mass grave. So begins mankind's most shocking realization: that the underworld is a vast geological labyrinth populated by another race of beings. Some call them devils or demons. But they are real. They are down there. And they are waiting for us to find them…
'Jeff Long has achieved something that has so far evaded both high-caste genre writers and literary colonisers: he has returned science fiction to its original vigour and – while maintaining all the headlong readability we associate with the form – made it a worthwhile moral tool again. The Descent is SF for the 2000s, from a writer who simply won't be told what he can't do. There should be more like it'
'A tour de force. A subterranean realm so expertly realised and credible, we feel it has existed all along. A dark, pervading, benighted beauty. If Kim Stanley Robinson's Martian colonists had headed down instead of up, this is the world they would have found'
'Without question, the best thing I've read so far this year. Long proves himself to be a wonderful storyteller. A stunning tour de force'
'This flat-out, gears grinding, bumper-car ride into the pits of hell is one major takedown of a read. Long writes with unearthly force and vision. What emerges is a War of the Worlds against a world that can't lose. A page-burner of a book'
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
Fiction
Angel of Light The Ascent Empire of Bones
Non-fiction
Outlaw: The Story of Claude Dallas
Duel of Eagles: The Mexican and US Fight for the Alamo
THE DESCENT
Copyright © Jeff Long 1999
All rights reserved
For my Helenas,
A Chain Unbroken
It is a fairy tale that writers are recluses quietly cohabiting with their muse. This writer, anyway, benefited from a world of other people's ideas and support. Ironically, ascent informed important moments in The Descent 's genesis. The book began as an idea that I presented to a climber, my friend and manager, Bill Gross, who spent the next fifteen months helping me refine the story. His genius and encouragement fueled every page. Early on he shared the project with two other creative spirits in the film world, Bruce Berman and Kevin McMahon at Village Roadshow Pictures. Their support made possible my 're-entry' into New York publishing. There a mountaineer and writer named Jon Waterman introduced me to the talents of another climber, literary agent Susan Golomb. She labored to make the story presentable, cohesive, and true to itself. With her sharp eye and memory of terrain, she would make a great sniper. I thank my editors: Karen Rinaldi for her literary candor and electricity, Richard Marek for his dedicated grasp and professionalism, and Panagiotis Gianopoulos, a rising luminary in the publishing world. I want to add special thanks to my nameless, faceless copy editor. This is my seventh book, and I only learned now that, for professional reasons, copy editors are never revealed to writers. Like monks, they toil in anonymity. I specifically requested the best copy editor in the country, and whoever he or she is, my wish was granted. My deep appreciation to Jim Walsh, another of the hidden minds behind the book.
I am not a spelunker, nor an epic poet. In other words, I needed guides to penetrate my imaginary hell. It was my father, the geologist, who set me roaming in childhood mazes, from old mines to honeycombed sandstone structures, from Pennsylvania to Mesa Verde and Arches national monuments. Besides the obvious and well-used inspirations for my poetic license, I'm obliged to several contemporary works. Alice K. Turner's The History of Hell (Harcourt Brace) was stunning in its scope, scholarship, and wicked humor. Dante had his Virgil; I had my Turner. Another instructor of the underworld was the indispensable Atlas of the Great Caves of the World, by Paul Courbon. 'Lechuguilla Restoration: Techniques Learned in the Southwest Focus,' by Val Hildreth-Werker and Jim C. Werker, gave me a 'deeper' appreciation of cave environments. Donald Dale Jackson's Underground Worlds (Time-Life Books) never quit amazing me with the beauty of subterranean places. Finally, it was my friend Steve Harrigan's remarkable novel about cave diving, Jacob's Well (Simon and Schuster), that truly anchored my nightmares about dark, deep, tubular realms.
The Descent was informed by many other people's work and ideas, too many to list without a bibliography. However, Turin Shroud , by Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince
