Masters of the Broken Watches by Razi Imam
“Jam-packed with action, adventure and magic! It takes you on a fantastical journey filled with descriptive imagery from start to finish. … A page-turner for sure!” —Hina Khan, reviewer
—∞—
You’ve probably seen the lithographs of the artist M.C. Escher, whose mind-bending optical illusions make you question the nature of reality. That’s the aptest comparison I can conjure for Razi Imam’s Masters of the Broken Watches. His debut novel is the literary equivalent of an Escher piece. It’s a bubbling stew of speculative science that makes you question the nature of time itself.
And while your mind is being blown by the ideas in this imaginative thriller, you’ll be in exotic locations from Central America to remote Vietnamese fishing villages with memorable characters who’ll keep you wondering if they can survive one scrape after another. Beyond Escher, it’s part Indiana Jones and part James Rollins adventure.
ACADEMIC TREACHERY AND A TEAM OF PARAMARINES
Our protagonist is Dr. Sebastian Miles, a gifted marine biologist who risks his life to make a ground-breaking discovery of small, luminescent snails in the Panamanian jungle. He also catches a glimpse of something swimming in the water emitting weird, beautiful lights.
His bosses aren’t that interested in Miles’ pursuit of evolutionary missing links until Miles demonstrates that the snails solve one of biology’s biggest puzzles. However, those above him hog the credit that Miles deserves in the published findings. In the high-stakes world of research and academia, that leaves Miles embittered and restless.
His problem becomes an opportunity, though, when Dr. Cebrían Alvarez, the new director of Scripps Institution of Oceanography, wants him on board. Alvarez heads a team of researchers who aren’t your typical nerdy scientists in lab coats. His team of aptly named “Paramarines” all bring world-class intellects blended with the operational and military savvy of a SEAL team. They’ll need all those abilities very quickly.
That’s because of what happens in the opening chapters, which are devoted to the most memorable heroes of the story, a poor Vietnamese fisherman named Pham Kai and his wife Minh. She has cancer, and it’s advancing too fast for them to accept the delays in the Vietnamese health system. Pham needs money to buy better, faster treatment, and he concludes the only way he can do it is to take a dangerous journey into disputed territory with China to find a “su vang,” an extremely rare fish that can sell for up to $50,000.
A TIME-ALTERING FISH AND A RACE AGAINST THE ODDS
Armed with his father’s detailed marine maps, Pham finds something even stranger: a fish with oddly changing light patterns that also seems to have eerie psychological effects. In turn, he is discovered by the Chinese navy in a harrowing encounter you won’t soon forget. You’ll never care more about a fish than you do in this tale as you follow the twists and turns in its journey from the hands of the Chinese and Vietnamese into Sebastian’s lab.
The researchers quickly understand the significance of the famous Arthur Conan Doyle quote: “When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” As they analyze the specimen, time outside the lab jumps forward 22 hours. Around them, only a few minutes pass. In other words, they’ve “bought time.” Then they discover even more bizarre time-shifting qualities that would give tremendous advantages to any government with exclusive control.
As news spreads, the Paramarines are pursued by both Chinese and U.S. forces. The Paramarines will have to be at their best for Alvarez to make it thorough and share the discovery with the entire world.
To make the story work, Imam, the CEO of an artificial intelligence company when he isn’t writing, had to write authentically about everything from the world of scientific competition to Panamanian jungles and Chinese politics. Meanwhile, he needed to explain ideas from quantum physics and our limited capacity as humans to grasp them. That’s quite a challenge, but Imam makes it all go down easy in a fast-paced, fascinating thriller that is the first in a planned series. You might say Imam’s “time” has come.
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The very best review I have read in a very long while. Which now means that any book reviewed by David Hetzel is worth investing the time in. Thank you for taking the time to pen the words.
Thanks! This is one of the best debut novels I’ve read in several years of doing reviews. Feel free to check out my novels, too…
Thank you Dennis for your wonderful review. You have inspired me to get going with my sequel. The next in the series is called “Masters of the Vanishing Walls”. Readers will join Paramarines in a global adventure introducing them to the unexplained phenomenon of the “Desert Gates”.