It's important to remember that this is a work of fiction. I thought the early parts with Decker Hawthorne being involved with the Shroud expedition etc. were unnecessary and could have been explained later in the story without much loss of information. The story took off for me once that was over.

I liked this book but not enough to go seek out the other two in the trilogy to see how the rest of the story develops. There seemed to be many ancillary characters whom I'm not sure really were needed in the story--though perhaps some of their importance will be seen in the other two books which I don't plan to read. ( )

What if someone decided to clone....... Christ?

This is Book One of the Christ Clone Trilogy and it was a hell of a ride
(pardon the pun). I've read other apocalyptic novels in the past, including a couple of
the lamentable Tim LeHaye "Left Behind" series and I've always found
them to be trite, quite predictable, and unbearably preachy, but this
one is completely different. Beauseigneur writes like Tom Clancy or
Michael Crichton, with a command of not only science and history, but
medicine, geography, politics, astrophysics and the Bible as well. It
is gripping and compelling from beginning to end and even at the end of
this first book, I'm still not sure who the "good guys" are....

The story begins in the early 1980s with a scientific exploration of the
Shroud of Turin (an event which actually happened, BTW). In the study
of the Shroud, samples were taken to be examined. One of the scientists
on the team (an atheist) has long held a theory that the earth and all
its inhabitants are the result of extraterrestrial experimentation and
the man who was crucified that dark Friday 2000 years ago was actually
an alien, a member of this Master Race. Imagine his surprise to find
that there were some living dermal cells to be found among the samples
taken of the area around the right heel of the Man on the Shroud. When
cultured, these "C-Cells," as he calls them, show amazing properties
which could lead to the cure for AIDS, cancer, in fact, every disease
known to mankind. What if...... Yep, he clones them, expecting to
create a duplicate of the alien known as Jesus. What he winds up
creating is so much more. But is it good, or evil? Would God allow His
Son to be created in a laboratory? Will this forbidden experiment lead
to the Triumph of Man or the Wrath of God? Can an impure being arise
from the sacred living flesh of Jesus?

Decker Hawthorne is a reporter working for NewsWorld magazine who winds
up raising the orphaned ward of his friend, Professor Goodman. But
Christopher Goodman is no ordinary boy. He has never been sick a day in
his life, heals overnight when injured, and has memories of biblical
times that wake him screaming from his sleep. In the 30 years covered
in this book, Decker becomes intimately involved with the inner workings
of world politics in his new position as aide to the secretary-general
of the UN, with Christopher never far from his side.

This book is both brilliantly researched and vividly written. The
intricacies of the plot twists and turns, the attention to the smallest
detail of political intrigue, the matter-of-fact directness of the
authors descriptions of cataclysmic events, nuclear wars, political
intrigue at the United Nations, and the logical order of events in this
book amazed me. The characters are so well-developed and fleshed out
that it is almost impossible to tell which "side" they are on. I'm
still not sure. ( )

Beauseigneur truly captures the vision of the anti-Christ in this provocative story of the End times... the first in a trilogy. Amazing how he weaves the story. It's almost as if you are there. ( )

More thrills contintued from the first two books of this triology ( )

Plot Summary: What happens, When & Where, Central Characters, Major Conflicts
Decker is a small town journalist, but he has the propensity to be in the right place at the right time and that pays out when he is able to finagle his way into the team researching the Shroud of Turin. Some strange events occur on his trip while they are studying the shroud--but not as strange as what happens years later when one of the scientists contacts him with news that he has discovered that one of the samples from the shroud contains living cells--and that he plans to make a clone from them. We move along into a world where political and natural (or supernatural) catastrophes occur one right after the other--including a worldwide disaster in which millions of people just suddenly die--Including Decker's wife and daughters. Decker ends up adopting the clone from the shroud--Christopher--and they both become involved in jobs at the United Nations--which has it's hands full after Arabs destroy the wailing wall, Israeli's retalitate, Russia invades, and Nuclear war threatens.





Style Characterisics: Pacing, clarity, structure, narrative devices, etc.
Told from Decker's point of view. The plot is full of suspense and moves very quickly, often skipping ahead several years. We get lots of scenes full of political maneuvering and intrigue which is fascinating and seems realistic. Some plot points and theories espoused by the characters seem VERY far fetched, but the author does a good job of laying them out so that the reader is able to accept them. The author also paints good word pictures that make the action come alive for the reader, and that illuminate the characters. Aside from Decker and Christopher, most of the other characters make just brief appearences and there isn't much development of them.


How Good is it?
Better than "Left Behind", with realistic scenes, and political intrigue. Religious history combined well with adventure and suspense, though readers may have different reactions to the underlying theories. ( )