Meg: Nightstalkers

The Meg Series, Book 5

By: Steve Alten

Narrated by: Keith Szarabajka

Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

In this fifth installment of the New York Times best-selling Meg series, Meg: Nightstalkers picks up where Meg: Hell's Aquarium left off.

Bela and Lizzy, the dominant megalodon siblings from Angel's brood, have escaped the Tanaka Institute to roam the Salish Sea in British Columbia. While Jonas Taylor and his friend Mac attempt to either recapture or kill the "sisters," Jonas' son, David, embarks on his own adventure, motivated by revenge.

Having witnessed his girlfriend's gruesome death, David has joined a Dubai prince's ocean expedition, tracking the 120-foot, hundred-ton Liopleurodon that escaped from the Panthalassa Sea. Haunted by night terrors, David repeatedly risks his life to lure the Lio and other prehistoric sea creatures into the fleet's nets, all while battling his own suicidal demons.

Steve Alten weaves these storylines together in a thriller that culminates in a final showdown between the most dangerous predators ever to inhabit the planet.

©2016 Steve Alten (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

A bit of a mess

I have no words for how desperately I wanted to love this book. I've been a faithful fan for probably twenty years but unfortunately Night Stalkers is a convoluted mess. Too many characters, subplots and far too much time without prehistoric sharks. And don't get me started about space time continuum / butterfly effect. I only stuck with this book because I've been reading the series from day one.

So bad it is offensive. *MINOR SPOILERS*

What a mess. Alten has never been a good writer, but the previous books in this series were entertaining. This book is a moronic chaos of sharks, whales, dinosaurs and time travel(!!!). The time travel plotline comes out of the blue, but is then more or less forgotten later. Alten gets lost in his own story. Women have always been tits with legs in the series, but this book is even worse. Alten seems to view all women as prositutes. It is, frankly, revolting.
Keith Szarabajka is a great narrator, but he can't make a scottish accent. It sounds horrible when he tries.
This will be my last Alten book.

Alten Knows How To Bring The Action

I've been a reader of the MEG series for quite some time.  I remember picking the first MEG book out at the local library in my hometown and thinking "what the heck is this?" I was enthralled. I grew up loving dinosaurs and sharks and this felt like the perfect combination of the two.  Fast-forward probably 10-15 years and you have me now - I still love dinosaurs and sharks and now the MEG series.  Alten has been writing these for years now and I've enjoyed each one of them in their own way. In book four (Hell's Aquarium) Alten introduces not only a new character but a whole new group of them from an underwater lake. Nightstalkers picks up where that left off (with a slight intro that got me back up to speed).  And just goes pedal to the metal from that point on.

Nightstalkers is right on par with the other MEG books along with Alten's non-MEG books.  There was even a small scene that would end up being a hint to his newer book Undisclosed (zero-point energy).  Alten knows how to weave ancient history (old dinos/sharks/animals/fish) and technology into a seamless and entertaining joyride of a book.

Nightstalkers is full of action and a lot of "breath-holding" scenes where you're really not sure how anyone is going to make it out alive. I like books like that.  Sure, sometimes they can be mindless, but every time Nightstalkers would slip into that Alten would throw a curveball with some new science or technology.

I also particularly liked that one of the characters had Parkinson's - since Alten himself also has this ailment.  It just felt like a nice inclusion and a way to write about it without shoving it in your face (it wasn't the main character or anything like that).

Overall, MEG: Nightstalkers was an action-past, slightly mindless, entertaining piece of fiction.  What more would you expect featuring prehistoric sharks!?

Good book

was good aside from all the global warming BS. should read vostok first but it's not available in audio

Good but relax on the..

I could have done without all the chauvinistic comments but other than that I enjoyed it.

Should have stopped at book 2

The book starts with David (Jonas' son) recuperating from attempted suicide after losing his girlfriend (Dubai prince sent her to keep tabs on David) of 1 week at the end of the last book. David and his friend immediately jump on a plane to Dubai so he can hunt for and get revenge on the Liopleurodon that killed said girlfriend. I guess he really wasn't that broke up over the previous girlfriend's death because once he gets to Dubai he meets a new love interest that he jumps straight into bed with and falls in love with (Dubai prince sent her to keep tabs on David, again).

Then we have mention of Angel's 2 megalodon children that were released by bad guys into the wild in the last book. They go on a rampage and kill some more people then, just for fun, a 60 year woman gets thrown into the story and just for kicks decides she wants to swimming with the 2 female megalodons. She has a photographer there to show the world that the megs aren't dangerous. The photographer gets pictures of the woman holding on to he dorsal fin of one of he Meg's swimming with it and in the next shot the woman is in the jaws of the Meg waving at the photographer. Of course she got eaten and the photographer decides to get in the water so he can get underwater pictures of the Megs. I shouldn't have to tell you, but he got eaten too.

Then we go to whales chasing David and his new love interest while they are in their super fast mini-sub, to the liopleurodon chasing the sub and the whale. The liopleurodon ends up getting killed... we think.

At the end of the book, everyone is back at the Tanaka Institute where everything and everyone comes together, even the liopleurodon. Jonas has decided to get out of the Meg business by selling the Tanaka Institute. The problem is he has made deals with two different buyers. One of he buyers shows up with one of the Meg sisters captured and the other sister following. Jonas and the Dubai prince (the other buyer) have brought a liopleurodon pup and a Miocene whale to store in the institutes aquarium. Then all hell breaks loose. The big liopleurodon (that was supposed to be dead) shows up and attacks the captive Meg and her sister which makes David angry because he raised the sisters since they were pups in the aquarium and of course he hates the liopleurodon because it ate his 1st girlfriend. David jumps in one of the super mini-subs and discovers the batteries are almost dead but he remembers the sub has hydrogen fuel tanks. His inner monolog tells him he could use an 8 second burn from the fuel tanks to escape the charging liopleurodon "but it would probably launch him buried nose first into the 7th row of the bleachers killing himself and God knows how many innocent people but he has no choice." Just as he ignites the fuel tanks the big liopleurodon appears in front of him with hyper-extended jaws and the sub is launched into the mouth of the monster through its gullet out the other side opening up a 2nd anus.....DONE. I can't take anymore of his.

Going downhill

The deeper I get into the series the more disenchanted I become with it. Simile written by a 14-year-old, hormonally charged without a clue I had a treat the opposite sex, the stories have evolved quite a bit from the first one which I thought was spectacular

Also - Mr. Alten - Orcas are not whales. If you’re going to write a book about marine life that’s a basic fact you should get correct

Love this series.

Love this series. Keeps getting better with each book. Keep up the great work Steve.

Another brilliant entry!

As for the 5th story of the meg series by steve Alten excellent installment awesome!

Meg and Co

The MEG series is getting a little long in the tooth. I feel a MEGs in space story around the corner. If they do it though, I will read it. I’ve loved all of Steve’s books since the first. I’m a disciple. It is getting tough to make these MEG books fresh though. If you enjoyed the others you’ll enjoy this. Chomp.

They've jumped the shark now!

Time travel and lasers powerful enough to make Darth Vader drool?! Come on now! Ridiculous!

amazing ending

not the best build up and there were moments where it went a little "out there" with the science fiction. the ending however was surprising and very satisfying.

Another installment.

Good book, Nice continuance, a few unusual bits, but entertaining.

looking forward to the next one.

a chore to finish

I wasn't impressed with this book. the meg was good this not so much :(

OTT

Basically, if it was a large prehistoric marine predator it'll be in the series, evolution now happens overnight and there's time travel. It's ridiculous.

As for the narration, the accents are utterly terrible, it would have been a better idea to just not try.

More enjoyable hokum.

So more creature feature stuff with time travel hinted at….that’s kinda way off centre. Why aren’t the main players dead yet? More lives than a prehistoric cat!…enjoy it for what it is. Fun fun fun…

Fun

I enjoyed relistening to this series, still got issues with the constant push of evolution. But if you can turn that off it's quite enjoyable.

The narrator has some annoying habits, mispronunciation of archipelago and a few other words. Later in the series his accents end up all over the place, especially when he's swapping between Scottish and Arabic accented English.

Will come back to it as and when I want a mindless listen.

extinction isnt forever

the book I loved and made me sad when the sisters died but the fact it links with the loch means there is a shared universe. I mean I want to see a Megalodon fight the loch ness monster

excellent

as all the Steve Alten books I've listened to quality reads that give an excellent understanding of the story

cool story, gets a bit trippy in the middle though

great story, however (spolier) the time dreams and time travel theme was a bit odd