James Rollins

In his 2006 thriller, Black Order, Jim Rollins dispatched his hero, Gray Pierce, to Denmark. While there, Pierce spent two days “visiting the dusty bookshops and antiquary establishments in the narrow backstreets of Copenhagen. He discovered the most help at a shop on Højbro Plads owned by an ex‑lawyer from Georgia.” No name. Just enough information that, if you were a fan of Steve Berry’s hero, Cotton Malone, you’d know instantly who Pierce was talking about. Jim’s purpose was to see if readers were paying attention and could discover the extent of crossover between his and Steve’s work.

He learned things on both counts.

Readers definitely noticed. Jim and Steve together received several thousand e‑mails (and still do to this day). When Steve reciprocated and included a reference to Sigma Force (Jim’s clandestine agency where Gray Pierce works) in his next novel, people noticed again. Together, they continued the experiment for several more books. Eventually, fellow thriller writer Raymond Khoury (who’s part of this anthology) joined the mix. It was fun, but it also alerted the writers to the fact that their readers wanted to see the characters together.

That wasn’t possible, until the opportunity provided by this anthology.

There are a lot of similarities between Malone and Pierce. Both are ex‑military. Single. With issues. They each work for a covert government agency – Pierce with Sigma, through the Defense Department – Malone, though now retired, freelances with his former employer, the Magellan Billet at Justice. And where Pierce deals more with science and a little history, Malone focuses on history, with a touch of science.

Steve came up with the broad idea of something in South America, on the Amazon. Jim took that thought and wrote a first draft of the entire story. Steve then revamped that draft, which Jim gave a final edit.

The result is about three hours in the lives of Gray Pierce and Cotton Malone.

On a riverboat, in the middle of nowhere.

Everything happens fast.

Nothing atypical for these two.