First, you take a bit from each of the disaster movies made in recent years, add a few current events (oil embargo, space exploration, the third world), and stir with liberal dollops of "Chariot of the Gods" type phenomena. Mix in a little soap opera, place it all on Noah's Ark afloat somewhere near the Bermuda Triangle and infest it with the "Andromeda Strain" and you have the essence of Allan Eckert's new thriller ["The HAB Theory"].

The essence and flavor, but not the exact recipe. To give that away would be to spoil a very good yarn that has just enough sci-fi to make it fantastic, but enough plausibility that it leaves the reader feeling—no, believing—that income taxes, presidential campaigns, and international relations are trivial….

Mr. Eckert has done a great deal of research and set his imagination to work on building a case for...