The World Beneath by Rebecca Cantrell

The World Beneath by Rebecca Cantrell
Narrator: Jeffrey Kafer
Series: Joe Tesla #1
Published by the author on January 28, 2014
Source: Purchased
Genres: Thriller
Length: 7 hrs 12 mins
Format: Audiobook
Purchase at Bookshop.org or Purchase at Amazon
Add on Goodreads

Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Rebecca Cantrell drops you into a vast, dark world: 100 miles of living, breathing, tunnels that is the New York City underground. This subterranean labyrinth inhales three million bustling commuters every day. And every day, it breathes them all out again... except for one.

Software millionaire Joe Tesla is set to ring the bell on Wall Street the morning his company goes public. On what should be the brightest day in his life, he is instead struck with severe agoraphobia. The sudden dread of the outside is so debilitating, he can't leave his hotel at Grand Central Terminal, except to go underground. Bad luck for Joe, because in the tunnels lurk corpses and murderers, an underground Victorian mansion and a mysterious bricked-up 1940s presidential train car. Joe and his service dog, Edison, find themselves pursued by villains and police alike, their only salvation now is to unearth the mystery that started it all, a deadly, contagious madness on the brink of escaping The World Beneath.

The World Beneath is just a fun book. Joe Tesla is rich and extremely intelligent, but can’t go outside due to extreme agoraphobia. While in the tunnels under New York, he meets a man who is then brutally murdered near a long bricked in train car. Joe has to make sure he doesn’t get killed too, and in the process stumbles into a nightmare of a conspiracy.

Joe is charming and while obviously not fearless, he is determined and inventive. He’s a whiz with computers, but also understands people, which is a nice change. His service dog Edison is adorable, and I was more worried for him than I was for Joe. He also has a couple people who are wholly on his side, and they each bring their own strengths.

The plot is well-done. The tension holds throughSubwayout and even though the reader knows who all the players all, you still wonder what can happen next. And the fact that Joe can’t go outside, is basically trapped in the tunnels and Grand Central makes for an interesting complication. There are lots of shops, restaurants, etc, attached to Grand Central, but how far those tunnels stretch, subway, sewage, steam, is invaluable to Joe in his search for the truth.

The World Beneath is fast-paced and enjoyable. If it were a movie, my husband and i would go see it, no question. There’s no romance, lots of blood, which is part of the problem for at least one character, plenty of suspicious behavior and a great hero.

It’s the first in a series, but finishes its story. It’s not just a set-up for the next one, which I appreciate, but the end does give you a thread left untied for the next one.

It also ends with a Christmas party, if you care. Seems silly, but I like to know that kind of thing. Sometimes, I match the books I’m reading to the season and this one takes place at the end of November and then has a scene in December when Joe and his friends get back together for an evening.