An inventive and impressively researched alternative account of the influence of Rome on the genesis of Christianity.
A debut revisionist historical novel imagines a political interpretation of Jesus’ ministry and the birth of Christianity.
Pontius Pilate is ordered to leave Rome to become governor of Judea, a role he does not relish, though it’s ostensibly a promotion. Judea is notoriously insurrectionist, dominated by Jewish zealots who chafe at Roman rule. Pilate makes little headway upon his arrival, but recruits Joseph of Arimathea, a Jew, to spy on the Jewish Council. Joseph convinces the merchant John to also help, and Pilate encourages him to pose as a prophet and proselytize pro-Roman messages of conciliation. John becomes increasingly popular over time and known as John the Baptist, but also disenchanted, he ropes in his cousin, Jesus, to be his replacement. Jesus’ own Judaism perfectly suits Pilate’s ends—he’s progressive and contemptuous of the attachment to traditional rituals, and extremely critical of violent radicalism. He preaches a message of peaceful coexistence with Roman rulers, and even encourages Judeans to be less hostile to tax collectors. He amazes gathering crowds with staged miracles. Despite Jesus’ growing following, many stalwart traditionalists vehemently oppose his teachings. But when John, arrested on political charges, threatens to reveal the subterfuge, Pilate quickly hatches an opportunistic plan. He conspires to have John executed, and orchestrates Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion, as well as an ersatz resurrection, to pit Jesus’ more pliable disciples against the anti-Roman contingent. Fleming develops a clever and historically convincing narrative that suggests a secular interpretation of the birth of Christianity, shorn of supernatural explanation. In addition, Pilate is made much more than a villain. While certainly impatient and capable of great cruelty, he also shows compassion and love, as evidenced by his utter devotion to his wife, Claudia. Jesus, too, is portrayed in artfully complex colors, theologically iconoclastic but also egotistical and sensitive to criticism. Fleming’s attention to historical detail is admirable—he must have studiously researched the cultural and political realities of the day. For those more interested in the scholarly plausibility of the plot, the author includes a note at the end of the book discussing precisely that.
An inventive and impressively researched alternative account of the influence of Rome on the genesis of Christianity.Pub Date: Nov. 9, 2016
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 369
Publisher: Wellspring Books
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
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