SEAN WYATT

Sean Wyatt is an agent with the IAA.

That acronym stands for the International Archaeological Agency which definitely sounds like an organization the United Nations would run but isn't. A man named Tommy Schultz created the IAA a few years before the first recorded adventure we have of Wyatt. "His parents had been fairly wealthy, and when they died suddenly, Tommy had inherited everything. His career in archaeology had barely begun when the accident happened. For a short time, he'd moped around, trying to find his life's direction. Then the idea for the agency had come to him one night while sitting alone at a bar. A news story about treasure hunters played on the television. He began to wonder what it might be like if he started an agency that recovered ancient artifacts and returned them to the rightful governments. At that moment, he began planning the IAA."

Prior to coming to work for his friend and fresh out of college, Wyatt had worked for a little known sub-agency inside the Justice Department called Axis. "The ultra secret agency was an Atlanta-based arm of the Justice Department that handled counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and internal investigations. They were occasionally called upon to handle dirtier jobs that the CIA, FBI, and NSA didn't want to touch. Axis operated with only eleven agents to keep things simple and clean, and deniability much more plausible." After considerable training, Wyatt had worked in that highly stressful arena for six, to him, very long years.

When his long-time friend Tommy Schultz had offered him a job as a recovery specialist with the IAA, he gladly accepted and in the few years since then he had never once regretted the move. He found the work as exciting as that with Axis without the constant worry that someone in the shadows was pointing a gun at him. That is somewhat strange considering the fact that in the many adventures we have of Wyatt, a considerable number of people are not only pointing firearms at him, they are frequently firing projectiles at him meant to end his life, not to mention the sharp knives thrust at him or the explosions meant to separate body parts.

He was in his mid-thirties. He stands 6' tall and weighs 180 pounds. He is in extremely good physical shape which is a very good thing because stealing back stolen artifacts gets a lot of very powerful thieves with their very dangerous henchmen very angry at Wyatt. And then there are the numerous dictators and mafiya bosses and warlords who come to believe that some of these hidden or lost or stolen items could provide great power and who therefore take very unkindly to someone like Sean Wyatt who wants to keep such items from them. It sure seems like life back at Axis was a lot safer.

I have been a huge sucker for years for archaeological adventures which contain enough cloak and dagger aspects to qualify for membership in this compendium. Clive Cussler's Dirk Pitt got me started in a way and Lara Croft, though not spy-ish at all, fueled that fire.

I was anxious to give Sean Wyatt a try for some time but kept finding other things pushing it back. Luckily that did  not last forever and I got to see how much fun these action-filled adventures can be.

Plus the idea of working for a best buddy who is also super rich - what's not to like?