''The Mohole Mystery'' is a juvenile

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

novel A novel is an extended work of narrative fiction usually written in prose and published as a book. The word derives from the for 'new', 'news', or 'short story (of something new)', itself from the , a singular noun use of the neuter plural of ...

, the eleventh in Hugh Walters' ''Chris Godfrey of U.N.E.X.A.'' series. It was published in the UK by

Faber Faber may refer to: People * Faber (surname) Companies * Faber & Faber, publishing house in the United Kingdom * Faber-Castell, German manufacturer of writing instruments * Faber Music, British sheet music publisher * Eberhard Faber, German ...

in 1968, in the US by Criterion Books in 1969 under the title ''The Mohole Menace''. It was also published in French as Pionniers des ténèbres, (literally "Pioneers of Darkness") by Éditions de l'Amitié in 1973 and as A ameaça de Mohole in Portuguese by Edições Dêagã.

Plot summary

A drilling project in

Dudley Dudley ( , ) is a market town in the West Midlands, England, southeast of Wolverhampton and northwest of Birmingham. Historically part of Worcestershire, the town is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley. In the ...

in the West Midlands region of the United Kingdom hits a cavern 20 miles beneath the surface of the Earth and detects strange

microbes A microorganism, or microbe, is an organism of microscopic size, which may exist in its single-celled form or as a colony of cells. The possible existence of unseen microbial life was suspected from antiquity, with an early attestation in ...

. UNEXA send Russian Serge Smylov down to search for other forms of life in a rocket-propelled capsule but it is damaged when it hits the bottom of the cavern. Then strange creatures start attacking him... The book, under its US title ''The Mohole Menace'', is mentioned in '' A Short History of Nearly Everything'' by

Bill Bryson William McGuire Bryson ( ; born 8 December 1951) is an American-British journalist and author. Bryson has written a number of nonfiction books on topics including travel, the English language, and science. Born in the United States, he has be ...

Project Mohole

The real

Project Mohole Project Mohole was an attempt in the early 1960s to drill through the Earth's Crust (geology), crust to obtain samples of the Mohorovičić discontinuity, or Moho, the boundary between the Earth's Crust (geology), crust and Mantle (geology), m ...

was an American project to sink a bore-hole through 15,000 ft of the Earth's crust into the

Mohorovičić discontinuity The Mohorovičić discontinuity ( ; )usually called the Moho discontinuity, Moho boundary, or just Mohois the boundary between the Earth's crust, crust and the Earth's mantle, mantle of Earth. It is defined by the distinct change in velocity of s ...

or "Moho". The project came to be called the "No Hole", and was discontinued by the US Congress in 1966 due to ever-rising costs and the fact that they had only managed to drill to a depth of 601 ft.

References

External links

The Mohole Mystery page
1968 British novels 1968 science fiction novels Chris Godfrey of U.N.E.X.A. series Faber & Faber books Novels set in the West Midlands (county) Novels set in subterranea {{1960s-ya-novel-stub