They were the whalers of the nineteenth century, leaving home for months, nay years at a time, in search of the largest creatures of the earth. It was their job to hunt these mammoth sea dwellers for their oil and feed the trade in hopes of raising enough coin to feed their families back in port. They are the hunters of the dark sea, in search of the deadly behemoth that is their stock and trade. It is a life and death profession where even the greenest member of the crew knows the odds of survival . . . until these odds are changed by an even deadlier hunter than themselves: an unearthly predator that is now stalking them. "Smartly told," "a surefire pageturner," "Mel Odom really knows how to keep a reader turning pages," are only some of the accolades bestowed on award-winning author Mel Odom. Turning his attention away from his usual fantasy kingdoms to the high seas of the nineteenth century in this pageturning adventure of the whaling trade, Odom combines the suspense of Alien with the historical storytelling of Caleb Carr and Michael Crichton. It's 1813 and Ethan Swain, swashbuckling first mate of the whaling ship Reliant, must face not just one but three bad guys (one of whom isn't even human) in this sea adventure-sf hybrid. Ethan is striving to earn an honest living after his previous career as a pirate, but he is finding the going tough serving under the cruel and incompetent Captain Folger. The crew of the Reliant needs just one more whale to fill the ship's hold and then they can set their sights for home. But, unfortunately for them, their luck has gone straight to the bottom of the Pacific as they find themselves pursued by a bloodthirsty pirate, a rapacious British naval officer, and a predatory alien who has acquired a taste for human flesh. Horatio Hornblower meets Moby Dick meets Predator in this rip-roaring yarn that's screaming to be made into a summer blockbuster movie. A crossover genre title that's sure to appeal to fans of sea sagas, science fiction, and horror. Recommended for all collections. Michael Gannon Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Mel Odom is the award-winning author of The Rover , as well as numerous books in the Forgotten Realms, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Mack Bolan, and the Shadow Run series. A devotee of historical research, Hunters of the Dark Sea is his first novel of historical horror. He lives in Moore, Oklahoma. Hunters of the Dark Sea 1813CHAPTER 1 Pacific Ocean 3° 28' S. Lat.--107° 12' W. Long.       "THAR SHE BLOWS!"The call to arms, after so many weeks at sea without a single sighting, caught Ethan Swain by surprise. At first, he thought he'd imagined the lookout's bawling voice.He'd given his attention over to the fishing net he'd been mending. Whenever his mind was too full of thinking, especially of mistakes or bad judgments he'd made in the past--and especially of the pain and guilt that was Teresa, he found working with the focused effort required to sort out the tangled skeins of a net or mend canvas helped keep his worries at bay.These days, there'd been far too many worries and not nearly enough distraction. After almost two years at sea, Reliant 's holds were only half-filled with whale oil barrels. They'd been so long without taking a whale that the ship's cooper had begun saying that he didn't know if he'd even remember how to build another barrel. He'd been joking with some of the rest of the crew. Captain Folger had caught wind of that tale through the ship's spy, who still yet remained unidentified, and had set Henry Paulk to making and unmaking barrels during his watches as punishment. Cap'n Folger, Ethan thought in disgust as he looked into the topgallant rigging of the mainmast where the lookout kept watch, is more of a problem than not sighting whales . But he fought to steer himself clear of such thinking. Thinking like that had gotten him into trouble just out of Boston and nearly ended his sailing career."Thar she blows!" Bill Fedderson cried out again.Realizing that the call wasn't his imagination, Ethan stood and looked out at the rolling green sea that was so different than the steel blue of the Atlantic Ocean he'd grown up around."Where away?" Ethan shouted. Hope flared through him, and he chose to let the emotion live instead of quashing it.Over the last seven weeks without taking a whale, there had been two other sightings. Both of those sightings had been hailed by Robert Oswalt, the greenhand they'd lately taken on under auspicious circumstances only a month before. A month, Ethan had reflected grimly, was no amount of time to train a greenhand and have him standing a lookout's watch. But Folger had ordered exactly that.Both of those sightings had turned out false, and poor Robert had been made to feel bad. Some of the crew faulted him, saying not only had he imagined whales, but probably he'd missed them while on his watches as well. Robert was still working in the ship's g