FOOL'S PARADISE

A treasure hunter devotes his life to discovering a long-lost mythical ship in this posthumous novel that launches a trilogy.

Bobby McAllister has led an eventful life unearthing sunken fortunes. So he invites fiction writer Granger Lawton to his Savannah, Georgia, home to write his biography. Treasure hunting can be treacherous; McAllister has run-ins with Mafia associates, for example, and prison becomes a genuine threat when he faces insurance fraud charges. His lifelong dream, however, is the Prize, a lost 18th-century treasure ship that some don’t think exists. McAllister claims two apparitions—a pirate and a mysterious woman named Larkin—in his adolescence inspired him to recover the Prize’s gold. Lawton not only has trouble believing McAllister saw these ghostly visions, he’s also reluctant to accept the treasure hunter’s offer to join his search. After conducting his own research, Lawton begins to suspect this mythical ship may actually be out there somewhere, but the danger associated with treasure hunts is very real. Ferguson’s lengthy novel packs in myriad subplots. McAllister, for example, endures various crew members’ deaths and saves kidnapped loved ones. These spark a few entertaining action scenes with flying bullets, explosions, and memorable villains. Unfortunately, males in the cast far outshine the women, whom men typically ogle. The author’s details about maritime life are edifying; we learn about salvage work, for example. Surprisingly, there’s little in the way of actual treasure hunting, with Lawton rightly describing one discovery as “anticlimactic.” All the fun of connecting clues happens in the sprightly latter half when finding the Prizeseems feasible.

A dense, often exciting tale of attaining dreams and loads of gold.