The Messiah Stones: A Novel for the Millenium

Benig, Irving

ISBN 10: 0679447806 ISBN 13: 9780679447801

Publisher: Random House Audio, 1995

Synopsis

What would it take to make you believe?

It's the end of world War II, and the dawn of the new Cold War. American intelligence forces in the Middle East are working undercover as a team of anthropologists. By complete accident -- or is it the ultimate in fate? -- they make one of the greatest discoveries of all time...

It's right now. College professor John McGowan, a man never particularly religious in any way, is shocked to discover that his long-missing father has bequeathed him a secret that will utterly change the lives of everyone who knows it. That extraordinary discovery -- the Messiah Stones, which have now been lost again -- serves as a beacon to announce the coming of the world's savior at the end of our millennium, John and his wife can't believe a word of it...until they are witnesses to a series of remarkable miracles and dramatic confrontations with the unknowable. Finally realizing their fate, John and Sarah travel to Jerusalem and come face-to-face with their ultimate destiny.

With The Messiah Stones, first-time author Irving Benig has created a gripping mystery that explores the question of why we believe what we believe, and what it would take to turn those beliefs inside out. It is a tale both of suspense and of the human spirit.

Howard McGillin has appeared on Broadway in The Mystery of Edwin Drood, She Loves Me, and Kiss of the Spider Woman. His television appearances include Jack's Place and Murder, She Wrote.

The Messiah Stones is available in hardcover from Villard Books.

About this title

From Booklist

When John McGowan responds to a letter informing him that he is the sole beneficiary named in a mysterious will, he embarks on a quest that leads him, his wife, and several others to change their lives. The will is that of his father, who disappeared when John was five. Bill McGowan was one of the discoverers of three stone tablets fashioned by the hand of God that absolutely promise the Messiah's coming in 2000; he became the stones' guardian until he was killed in 1967. Now his son is called to take up the guardianship; how he comes to accept that mission is this inspirational novel's story. Villard is banking a 150,000-copy first printing that the current bull market in pop theology will make the book a big hit. But first-time author Benig's prose is bland, his plot considerably more talky than eventful, his characters flat, and his religion a farrago of that twentieth-century hybrid, Judeo-Christianity, and New Age-ish stuff like reincarnation and out-of-body experiences--that is, it's at least mildly heretical. Ray Olson

From Library Journal

First novelist Benig makes thirtyish college professor John McGowan the recipient of an incredible gift. John's father, who deserted his family when John was five, leaves an unexpected epistolary bequest that changes John's sedentary life forever. The letters detail the discovery of ancient relics that foretell the date of the final coming of the Messiah. John and his wife begin a search for truth that insinuates itself into their very beings. This mystery, written in memoir form, is at once contemplative, philosophical, and spiritual. Though there's no murder here, it still abounds with suspense. Recommended.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Random House Audio
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0679447806
• ISBN 13: 9780679447801
• Binding: Audio Cassette