Description

Publishers Weekly. "The best combination of science fiction and technothriller this year."

**Deep beneath Ayers Rock, something has awakened. And it's sending a message humanity isn't ready to receive.**

When a terrorist detonates a nuclear device under South Africa's Vredefort Dome, it triggers more than geological chaos. Tracking stations across the globe detect a powerful transmission emanating from inside Australia's Ayers Rock-broadcasting the exact same message sent into space aboard the Voyager probe decades earlier.

Captain Robert Hawkins has just returned from a mission that cost him everything. Still reeling from a devastating personal tragedy, he's pulled into a crisis that defies explanation. Something impossibly old-and impossibly advanced-has been hidden inside the world's largest monolith. And now it's reaching out to four other sites around the globe.

Assembled by presidential adviser Steven Lamb, an unlikely team of experts must unravel an ancient mystery: a brilliant young physicist who sees patterns no one else can detect, a statistical projection specialist whose numbers predict catastrophe, and a geologist who understands the earth's deepest secrets. Together with Hawkins's special operations expertise, they must penetrate Ayers Rock and discover what lies within.

But as they descend into the chamber at the heart of the ancient stone, they realize the transmission isn't a greeting-it's a warning. And what they find inside will challenge everything humanity believes about its place in the universe.

From the author of the bestselling Area 51 series comes a heart-pounding military techno-thriller that combines cutting-edge science, ancient mysteries, and pulse-pounding action. Perfect for fans of Michael Crichton, James Rollins, and Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child.

**The Rock is where science fiction meets special operations-and the fate of the world hangs in the balance.**