Deception Point
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Deception Point (2001) is a thriller novel by Dan Brown, the author of The Da Vinci Code, Angels and Demons, and Digital Fortress.
Contents |
[edit] Plot summary
Deception Point opens with a flailing NASA personnel making a startling discovery— an ancient meteorite is found buried within an Arctic glacier. Samples taken from this meteorite show that there are fossils of some Isopod-like life forms inside it, raising speculation that humans are not alone in the universe.
Meanwhile, Rachel Sexton's father, Senator Sedgewick Sexton, is fueling his Presidential campaign by focusing on NASA's budget overspends. It is later revealed that he is funding his campaign by taking illegal bribes from the Space Frontier Foundation.
NASA proves the authenticity of the meteorite with unbreakable facts, things that can only occur in meteorites. Several civilian scientists including Rachel Sexton, an intelligence analyst from the NRO, and Micheal Tolland, a celebrity oceanographer, are dispatched to the site in order to investigate the origin of the fossils, verify NASA's findings and also to improve it's public image. Before any official announcement can be made, however, one of the scientists is killed by Delta Force, an elite government military team (though NASA and the scientists are not aware he was murdered.)
The remaining scientists quickly realize that all is not what it appears to be as they struggle to separate truth from deceit. They are chased by Delta Force, who are intent on stopping them from finding evidence against the meteorite. They soon realize that the meteorite is not extraterrestrial (the "alien bugs" are in fact fossils of giant isopods) and was inserted into the glacier by drilling beneath the frozen sea. In the end, it turns out the person who organized it all is William Pickering, admininistrator of the National Reconnaissance Office and Rachel's boss.
[edit] Characters
- Rachel Sexton: An intelligence analyst working for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). Daughter of Sedgewick Sexton.
- Michael Tolland: Oceanographer, producer of documentary films, and captain of a SWATH class research vessel known as the Gayo, he was called in to produce a film on the arctic discovery. He evolves into Rachel's love interest by the end of the novel.
- Zachary Herney: President of the United States who is running for a second term.
- Senator Sedgewick Sexton: Corrupt United States Senator running against Herney for President. Father of Rachel Sexton.
- Lawrence Ekstrom: NASA administrator. While he initially appears to be the villain, this possibility is eventually discredited.
- William Pickering: Director of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). He is revealed to be the brains behind the Delta Force assassinations and the manipulator of events throughout the novel.
- Marjorie Tench: Senior advisor to Zach Herney. She is killed by a car bombing organized by William Pickering when she began to become a nuisance to his plans.
- Gabrielle Ashe: Personal aide to Sedgewick Sexton. She was seduced by Sexton early on their partnership, and eventually grows wary of his corrupt nature. Upon hearing his plot to commercialize the space exploration industry, she secretly aids Rachel in ending her father's political career.
- Corky Marlinson: A brilliant astrophysicist with a somewhat high opinion of his abilities. He is a friend of Michael Tolland and is one of the outside parties called in to examine the discovery. He and Michael are the only two of the original four still alive by the end of the story.
- Delta-One, Delta-Two, and Delta-Three: Agents of the Delta Force, they are responsible for the majority of the numerous civilian casualties throughout the story.
- Norah Mangor: Glaciologist from the University of New Hampshire
[edit] Trivia
- The main plot may have been inspired by ALH84001, a meteorite found in Antarctica and first mistakenly believed to contain fossils of extraterrestrial life.
[edit] Agencies involved
- National Reconnaissance Office
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Delta Force
- USS Charlotte (SSN-766)
[edit] Code solution
The code that appears at the end of the book, after the main plot
1-V-116-44-11-89-44-46-L-51-130-19-118-L-32-118-116-130-28-116-32-44-133-U-130
is decrypted by looking at the first letter on the chapter decided by the number. For example, the first letter of chapter 116 is "C". The resulting text is
TVCIRHIOLFENDLADCESCAIWUE
Decryption is performed using a columnar transposition cipher, termed a "Caesar Square" cipher in the book (this is unrelated to the Caesar cipher). The letters are arranged into a five-by-five square:
TVCIR HIOLF ENDLA DCESC AIWUE
and read each column from the top down.
THEDAVINCICODEWILLSURFACE
Add spaces and correct capitalization, and you get the plaintext,
The Da Vinci Code will surface
a reference to the book The Da Vinci Code, also by Dan Brown.
[edit] Artistic license
As is customary with his novels, Brown opens with a statement asserting the veracity of all information in his work. Specifically for Deception Point, it is claimed that "All technologies described in this novel exist." While the author claims no artistic license in regards to fact and technology, some of the claims in Deception Point are somewhat suspect.
[edit] Marianas Trench
Brown says that the "meteorite" is actually a rock taken from the bottom of the Marianas Trench, the deepest underwater trench in the world. He says that the trench is so deep that no manned craft has ever explored it, and most probes sent to the bottom have been crushed by the pressure. In fact, the trench was explored by man as early as 1960.[1]
[edit] Canadian sovereignty
Much of the novel takes place on Ellesmere Island "in the high arctic", within the base set up by the US military and NASA there. The base includes a habisphere and landing strip. In reality, Ellesmere Island is part of the Nunavut Territory of Canada. It is highly unlikely that Canada, which has a military base on the island (Alert), would allow the US to build a base on the island, or be unaware of it having done so. The Canadian Space Agency would also likely be involved in any such operation since it is a close partner of NASA and a member of the International Space Station. If Canada was not alerted due to the secret nature of the operation, the president's international address in the book outlining the discovery would likely result in a large diplomatic incident as the entire exercise would be a violation of international law.
[edit] Bathynomous giganteus
The name of the extant isopod species resembling the fossils in the [forged] meteorite is spelt Bathynomous giganteus -the correct spelling being Bathynomus giganteus. According to the novel's 2000s setting it's a "recently" discovered species (while new species, especially marine invertebrates, are described practically on a daily basis); however, the successful procurement of two live specimens by a U.S. seaquarium in need of novelties had been chronicled in an early 1980s Reader's Digest issue.
[edit] Disputed technology
The foreword to Deception Point includes the line "all technologies described in this book exist." However, this is not true, as several technologies in the book are either non-existent or impossible.
The most notable non-existent technology is the remote controlled flying "microbot", which is a robot as small as a fly that can recharge by locating close to a power outlet, charging power from the induced electric field. It can also take and send digital pictures wirelessly over long distances. No current man-made wireless airborne technologies can come close to this small size described in the book.
The following weapons technologies also do not exist, or are impossible:
- an underwater rifle which can send jets of liquid water with enough force to break bones.
- a snow rifle which compacts snow into ice projectiles similar to bullets
- a desert rifle which can melt sand and mold it into glass projectiles similar to bullets
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- The underwater rifle is the most feasible of the three weapons mentioned. However, it cannot be as powerful as Dan Brown claims.
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- The snow rifle is not feasible simply because ice is unsuitable as ammunition. Firing an ice bullet would, under most circumstances, melt it, either due to friction or the heat of the propellant. And if the bullet does not melt, it will shatter since ice is brittle. The feasibility of an ice bullet propelled by gunpowder has been disproved by the Discovery Channel program MythBusters. Alternatively, as the point of the ice weapon was to concuss and not to kill a weapon very similar to a paintball gun (using compressed air) is inside the realm of possibility.
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- The desert rifle is also not feasible, or even advantageous, because the temperature needed to melt sand into glass (in excess of 1500° Celsius) requires a power source that will take up much more space than regular ammunition. There is also the problem of insulating the heat from the molding unit to prevent burns to the soldier or heat stress to the weapon. In addition, very few deserts on the planet are sandy deserts.
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- Brown's hypothetical weapons may be an extrapolation of a real military field manual titled TM 31-210 Improvised Munition Handbook (ISBN 0-9759009-0-0), published by the Department of Defense. However, this book describes improvisation methods such as field-made gunpowder, makeshift projectiles, etc. No allusion is made to rifles that are capable of manufacturing ammunition of the kind mentioned in the novel.
- The hologram gun used by the military to project large virtual images onto enemy air space (as described in the book) does not actually exist. It is most likely impossible since one would need two light sources on opposite sides of the projection to make a three-dimensional hologram. Otherwise the light will propagate away from the source into infinity, creating no hologram.
- The Aurora aircraft mentioned in the novel has long been rumored to exist, but its existence is highly speculative and without any concrete proof. [1]
- An F-14 is described in the novel as having a 1,500 mph supercruise and being capable of a 3,000 mile flight. In reality this speed of travel is reflective of a maximum speed attainable only in short sprints on full afterburner due to fuel and engine considerations, with supersonic supercruise capability only seen on modern fighters such as the F-22 Raptor. On one occasion (September 1989), an F-14A (Plus) (probably "clean" or without external stores or stations) briefly demonstrated a supercruise capability. Presumably this is a capability common to similar configurations of the more advanced F-14B and D models, which share the same powerful GE engine (but not the Lockheed 345 engines cited by Brown, which are pure fantasy; Lockheed-Martin builds aircraft, not engines). Supercruising, or extended cruising flight at supersonic airspeed, about 760 mph near sea level, decreasing to about 660 mph at 30,000 feet, is done by fighter aircraft at only slightly greater than the speed of sound (mach 1) and not the mach 2.5 airspeed suggested by Brown. Additionally, the novel does not mention the numerous in-flight refuels required for a journey of such long duration in an aircraft with a somewhat lesser range. The plausibility of landing a fast jet designed for carrier operations on an improvised ice strip is also somewhat suspect.
- Counter to reality, both the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior and HH-65 Dolphin described in the book have rather capable radar systems. While the Coast Guard's HH-65 Dolphin does carry an on-board weather radar, it is doubtful it has the capability to track both air and surface targets, and while the Kiowa Warrior does carry some sensing equipment, it is related to threat detection and while the helicopter used to carry a version of doppler radar, it was only used for navigation. The extreme range and flight duration given to the Kiowa Warrior in the novel is certainly beyond possibility without refueling stops that go unmentioned in the novel. The Kiowa is also described as carrying more than fifteen Hellfire missiles, which is rather excessive both in terms of weight and physical space. In reality, the Hellfire payload of the aircraft is only four missiles.
- Unlike the submarine described in the book, no Los Angeles class submarine has an anechoic chamber. There is simply not enough space to house such an unnecessary piece of equipment. Additionally, people inside the chamber would cause reflections of sound energy, thus negating the entire purpose of the chamber.
[edit] Misuse of Title "Agent"
- During his first meeting (in the context of the novel) with Rachel Sexton, her boss, NRO Director William Pickering, greets her as "Agent Sexton". The term agent has a specific legal meaning for U.S. Government employees, such as special agents or consular agents. Intelligence analysts are never called agents, not even informally.
[edit] References
| Dan Brown Books |
| Digital Fortress (1998) | Angels and Demons (2000) | Deception Point (2001) | The Da Vinci Code (2003) | The Solomon Key (?2007) |
| Films |
| The Da Vinci Code (2006) | Angels and Demons (2008) |
