How much did I dislike this book, Let me count the ways. It is the story of a scholar searching for a lost dead sea scroll. Many people around him die. There are spies and intrigue. The basic story was not bad. However the rest kinda stunk. First I should have realized that the book would be written with some pretension. Any author who feels the need to place Dr. in front of his name in a non-scholarly work is in need of ego stroking. Second was a rather dizzying writing style that covers fifteen years. Reading this book was like watching one of those movies where they fast forward through someones life only to slow to a snails pace during the part they find important. Second there are two primary love interests in the story. The first is a strong, opinionated, independent woman who is murdered not long before she would have died of cancer anyway. The second only shows backbone when supporting her man or her womanly sanctity is at serious risk. The third, and primary reason I disliked this book was its preachy and at times down right insulting nature to anyone who is not Muslim. At one point in the book the author states "it is not Jews we hate it is Zionists". Later the author insinuates that Israel was formed due to Jews milking the sympathy the world felt after the Holocaust. I will admit that the Mossad is a scary group. However his descriptions of the Mossad and imaginary Prime-minister as heartless and somewhere past ruthless was shocking. Even more shocking was the description on one of the Mossad agents sounding a lot like the pictures of jews on Nazi propaganda. The Vatican was shown with little more kindness. The Vatican Assassin was respectful to an old nun. The Pope was written as a scheming dolt.
The assassins were swarthy. All of the Muslim characters were insightful, intelligent, and kind. This was even so with the sympathetic teenage bomb builder. I purchased this book for my kindle because it sounded like a fun adventure and it was only 99 cents. What I got was religious propaganda and head full of steam. This book is about as far from recommended as I can get.
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