Vulcan's Forge

A Novel

By: Jack Du Brul

Narrated by: J. Charles

Length: 10 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's summary

Beneath the Pacific Ocean a volcano surges upward, carrying in its fiery heart a mineral more powerful than uranium. When the volcano breaks the ocean's surface, nations will battle to control what is known as Vulcan's Forge - a source of limitless, clean, nuclear power.

The secret of Vulcan's Forge begins to unravel when Mercer, a man of many talents now working for the US Geologic Survey, learns that the daughter of an old friend is in danger. Saving her takes Mercer from the Oval Office to a secret submarine off Hawaii. On the islands, a secessionist movement has turned violent and the US trembles on the brink of a civil war, while behind the scenes, shadowy figures jockey for control of the emerging volcano.

©2008 Jack Du Brul (P)2008 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Doesn’t play on Echo

This is a wonderful story, but you need to listen to it using the Audible app.

I tried multiple times to use the Amazon Echo and never was able to get it to play.

About this book

I liked the story but the narators voice was kind of boring. It was good though for a first book

Not quite Cussler

First, the story itself is action packed and made me want to finish it to find out what happened. The reader speaks so fast that I lost some of what he said -- and his voices for some characters are too artificial to be enjoyable. Clive Cussler knows how to make books that have great plots, too, but Cussler knows that gratuitous sex is voyeuristic, unnecessary, and turns off some readers - like me - who would like to hear the story without having to be dragged down an alley of verbal porn. I'll try one more book, but Mr. du Brul, please grow up as an author. You could sell good books without disgusting your customers. You can trust the imaginations of your readers with suggestive hints and probably make everyone happy.

Ready for more of his books.

Jack De Brul, I can see why Clive Cussler used him as a co- writter!
J. Charles, I have enjoyed him narrating several books now.

A Fun listen...but be warned....

I've been working my way through all of the Philip Mercer books by Jack Du Brul. I read them several years ago, and now I'm listening to the audio versions. I love them. That said, after years of reading Tom Clancy, I find the accuracy and plausibility lacking in these books, particularly with regards to military/combat aspects. These books rely on an astonishing number of coincidences in the plot, making them totally unrealistic, but I don't care.

J. Charles is a great narrator, who brings the Mercer character to life amazingly well, but his portrayal of various accents is comical. These books have characters from all over the U.S. and the globe. Eastern European accents are spot on, but Asian and German accents sound like caricatures from the South Park cartoon. His Southern accent sounds like a Foghorn Leghorn character from a Warner Brothers cartoon. If you can get past that - he's really good!

Can’t wait for another

If this was Mr. DuBrul’sfirst book I really enjoyed it. It kept me on the edge of my seat and always kept me interested. I hope he will continue with the series I can’t wait

Pretty good

I downloaded this because Du Brul co-writes with Clive Cussler and I wanted to see what his work is like by itself. It is a good mystery novel, albeit, basic. He goes into a lot of detail justifying and explaining what is going on. It's missing that extra WOW that Cussler adds. That being said, it is worth the download.

Never a dull moment!

Mercer is a hero's hero. Well paced, action, science, entertainment! J Charles performance is wonderful. Four stars because the Director could have better-researched Hawaiian pronunciations and the Editor could have spent more time cleaning up mouth noise.

Not a very good listen

Would you try another book from Jack Du Brul and/or J. Charles?

I have read another of his and it was pretty good. That was why I gave this one a listen. I was sorely disappointed in this one.The storyline was okay. But the details were awful. It was obvious that the author's entire knowledge of firearms, martial arts, and combat came entirely from TV and movies. Almost nothing was right.

What could Jack Du Brul have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

If he had done any research at all he would have had a greater understanding of how firearms function and the effects they have on targets. For that, an understanding of how the human body reacts would have also been nice. All in all, little of those scenes was believable.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

Barring a complete rewrite of the book, I would NEVER recommend this as a movie.

Any additional comments?

Trite and unbelievable. That was my takeaway. It'll be a while before I try another of the Philip Mercer series...

Vulcans Forge.

I enjoyed it completely, and now I understand why Clive Cussler would work with such a great story teller. I look forward to Jack's next book with anticipation. Well done!