Hardcover 1st edition
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Author | Clive Cussler |
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Cover artist | Garden Studio |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Series | Dirk Pitt Novels |
Genre | Adventure, techno-thriller |
Publisher | Viking Press |
Publication date
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1976 |
Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
Pages | 314 pp (Hardcover edition) |
ISBN | |
OCLC | 2347062 |
813/.5/4 | |
LC Class | PZ4.C9856 Rai PS3553.U75 |
Preceded by | Iceberg |
Followed by | Vixen 03 |
Raise the Titanic! is a 1976 adventure novel by Clive Cussler, published in the United States by the Viking Press. It tells the story of efforts to bring the remains of the ill-fated ocean liner RMS Titanic to the surface of the Atlantic Ocean in order to recover a stockpile of an exotic mineral that was being carried aboard.
Raise the Titanic! was the third published book to feature the author's protagonist, Dirk Pitt. It was the first of Cussler's novels with a prologue set long before the main story, describing an incident with consequences resolved in the present day.
The book was adapted into a 1980 feature film, Raise The Titanic, directed by Jerry Jameson. The film was produced by Lord Grade's ITC Entertainment. Although it starred respected and popular actors and boasted a big budget, the movie was a box office bomb and received little critical or popular praise.
In 1987, Dr. Gene Seagram leads the top-secret Pentagon program Meta Section, which secretly attempts to leapfrog current technology by 20 to 30 years. One result: the Sicilian Project, which uses sound waves to stop incoming ballistic missiles. The immense power needs of the Sicilian Project can be met only by an extremely rare mineral called byzanium. After satellite data pinpoints the most likely source of byzanium, Meta Section sends Sid Koplin to Novaya Zemlya, an island off the northern coast of the Soviet Union. There he discovers that the byzanium ore has already been mined. While making his way back to his hidden boat Koplin is shot and captured by a Soviet guard but is rescued by the story's protagonist, Dirk Pitt.
Using clues found by Koplin, Seagram determines that the byzanium — a chunk worth more than a quarter of a billion dollars in 1912 figures — was mined in the early part of the 20th century by a group of Coloradan miners, including Joshua Hayes Brewster. The group was originally hired by the French government, but persuaded by the U.S. government to steal the mineral for the United States. Brewster and his men engage in a running battle with French assassins as they crisscross Europe trying to get their stolen goods home. Only Brewster reaches England alive, and he books passage on the maiden voyage of the great White Star Line ship Titanic.