Five years and several billion dollars in the making, Bright Star is a top-secret Defense Department satellite that not only pinpoints enemy ships, tanks, planes, artillery, and missiles but also simultaneously "paints" up to a thousand targets, coordinating a multiple-beam high-energy laser attack to enemy forces from the battlefield within minutes. The nation possessing Bright Star will have an impenetrable nuclear umbrella as well as an overwhelming tactical advantage on the battlefield for years to come.
When the space shuttle - with Bright Star aboard - mysteriously crashes near the coast of Maine, ex-Navy SEAL Philip Drake is called in to retrieve the satellite before it falls into the hands of the highest bidder in the covert arms market.
With high tension and riveting, state-of-the-art action above and beneath the sea, Bright Star fulfills the promise of Stevenson's debut.