In 1987 we see Roberto at the height of both his career and physical fitness. The inclusion of Roberto is a clever way to link the past and present sections of the novel together. How many of us have taken a minimal wage job purely because we need any amount of income? How many times have we wished something exciting would happen? Or been faced with a situation and thought: ‘I’m not paid enough to deal with this’? Fair enough the fate of the world isn’t typically at stake but it was fun and refreshing to see how ordinary yet very inquisitive people might react in an extreme situation. In a practical sense, I think a lot of readers can relate to Teacake and Naomi. Teacake and Naomi are just two ordinary people who, despite being scared, are trying to do their best in a crazy situation.
While we do get this in the form of Roberto, I love that Koepp chose to include two ordinary people with no hidden skills or connection to our scientist protagonist. Stories that focus on world ending threats typically focus on military figures and scientists. My favourite characters in Cold Storage are Teacake and Naomi. These easy transitions between past and present made learning about the characters a fun experience – rather than being left wondering when the main story was going to start again. The novel is very descriptive but, even when the story switches to a backstory section, Koepp always takes care of his readers and makes sure to carefully anchor them back into the present day.
The first thing I noticed about the story was David Koepp’s engaging writing style. With the top secret base now a regular storage facility, a now-retired Roberto must rely on the facilities two young guards – Teacake and Naomi – to help him stop a world ending emergency. That is until the containment vessel starts to break down. A single sample of the fungus is collected and placed in deep storage for thirty years where it is all but forgotten about. They manage to contain the threat but not before it claims the lives of twenty-seven people. In 1987 Roberto and Trini are alerted to the presence of a deadly fungus in rural Australia.
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