Welcome back to Books With Cause. Let’s dive straight into my latest review.
I’ve always been a film lover. Films are probably my second love – after books. Probably because there’s such a crossover. I’m a ’90s kid, so videos (VHSs) were common presents I received for birthdays and Christmases. Some films I must’ve watched so many times that I wore out the tape. But back in those days, I didn’t realise that films were written. That’s a bit of a bonkers sentence, even when I read it back. I knew that what I was watching was made up, and it was a group of actors playing pretend, but I just presumed they were making it up. It was a few more years before I realised that the words coming out of their mouths were written by somebody else.
I didn’t realise how many David Koepp films I’d seen without even realising. Jurassic Park, Mission: Impossible, and Spider-Man (2002), to name perhaps the most well-known. Little did I realise just how much I owe to David Koepp for the joys of my childhood. Just last year, I saw three films at the cinema that were all written by Koepp. Presence and Black Bag (both directed by Steven Soderbergh) and Jurassic World Rebirth. Based on US box office receipts, Koepp is the third most successful screenwriter of all time with a total gross of over $6.2billion.
On a more recent trip to the cinema, I saw a trailer for a film called Cold Storage and liked the look of it. When I looked it up, I discovered that it was adapted from a novel by David Koepp. In 2019, Cold Storage was Koepp’s first published novel – he published a second in 2022. The film version (out now) stars Georgina Campbell, Joe Keery, and Liam Neeson. What’s more is that Koepp wrote the screenplay too. That must mean he’s been paid twice for writing the same story. Clever bloke.
From here on out, I’ll be talking about the book alone as the plot does differ slightly, along with some variation on character names.
The book opens in December 1987, when two Pentagon Bioterror Operatives, Roberto Diaz and Trini Romano, are called out to Australia to deal with an emergency. They immediately have to deal with a deadly fungus which has already wiped out an entire village. Between them, they’re able to contain the virus. They take it back to the States, where they bury it deep underground in a government facility.
The story then jumps to 2019, where the government facility has since been sold to a self-storage company. Naomi and Travis are two employees working the night shift when a number of odd things start to happen. The virus escapes the vault, infecting a rat king and a deer. And that’s only the beginning. Travis and Naomi have no idea of the dangers of what they’re dealing with. There’s only one person on the planet who might be able to help them. And that’s the retired Roberto Diaz.
At the time of writing this review, I haven’t yet seen the film. But I will. The thing that struck me the most is that this feels like a story which would make a better film than a book. This is not intended as a knock on Koepp. The man is clearly a master at his craft. He knows how to come up with story ideas and execute them. His CV speaks for itself. I get the impression that after years of writing blockbusters, Koepp wanted to try his hand at writing a novel. And there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact, I think it’s important that any writer tries their hand at as many different styles and formats as possible.
While there is nothing wrong with the story or the writing here, the issues lie in the execution. There are numerous cases within this book where the narrator jumps around from people’s heads, as well as jumping around in terms of time. This can occur multiple times on the same page. One moment we’re in Naomi’s head, and then another moment we’re in Travis’s. One moment we’re in 2019, and in the next paragraph, a character is thinking about something that happened ten years ago.
I think all of these instances are understandable because they’re not issues in films. We tend not to be in a character’s head in a movie. Likewise, if the time shifts, then we know that because we get presented with a different visual scene. The bottom line is that things like that make it clear we’re reading the book of a writer who is trying their hand at something new. Respectfully, I don’t think this manuscript would’ve made it off the slush pile if it were written by a debut writer without the pedigree of Koepp.
There are a lot of positives within the characterisation. In Roberto and Trini, I was getting flashbacks to Sam Neil and Laura Dern in the original Jurassic Park. Meanwhile, Travis is this awkward adolescent who has the hots for Naomi. He’s doing everything he can to try to keep his calm and impress her when in the face of a terrifying crisis. And let’s be honest. It can be hard enough getting a girlfriend without the threat of a deadly virus.
My Goodreads rating: ★★★☆☆ (3 stars)
