Sky Ship — Robert P. McAuley

You've seen Die Hard, which took place in an office building; Die Hard Two: Die Harder, in an airport; Passenger 57, starring Wesley Snipes -- a sort of Die Hard in an airplane; Under Siege starring Steven Seagal aboard a U.S. Navy battleship, a kind of Die Hard on a ship; and Speed -- Die Hard on a bus.Now, Die Hard has been re-imagined as an action adventure on the greatest airship ever created: a state-of-the-art, aircraft carrier-sized zeppelin. The era of the great airship –- when monsters of the sky such as the Graf Zeppelin and the Hindenburg made trans-Atlantic flights -- is re-visited; but this time, the new zeppelin, Sky Ship, is a marvel of ultra-modern technology and luxuries. Sky Ship lifts off on its maiden voyage from its home base in Florida, taking high-rolling passengers on a majestic, low-altitude tour of the South American coast. Among the travelers is a team of terrorists (masquerading as a mideast international soccer club) led by Col. Abdul Aziz of the militant Republic of Irajh. The Colonel's mission: to take control of the airship and use it to attack a meeting of OPEC with deadly nerve gas.The resulting chaos will leave the world's oil companies in crisis -- a crisis that the Republic of Irajh has positioned itself to take advantage of by hoarding oil for years: Irajh will corner the world market on oil and dominate the tinderbox that is the mideast.