Resurrection

I read a lot- for work, leisure and education. The challenge for me is finding a book that is well written AND interesting. It's frequently one or the other. This book was the best of both worlds. This book really is literature and it made me want to turn the page. The bonus is that I found it to be truly thought provoking. It's a book I would recommend to a friend, and it's a perfect one for a book group.

This book gleans from a lot of books we have already read. We know about the Sacred Feminine, we have heard about the Gnostics, that bring more insight to the events during Jesus' time, and His inner circle's charge to continue His teaching, etc. What Malarkey has done was to combine in a great story all of this points. A young lady goes to Egypt after WWII to see about her father's mysterious death - she finds her father was studying the females' role in religions and that he found and translated part of The Gospel of Thomas, and Phillip, etc. The conflict of who would kill to possess these ancient scripts is exciting. The romance(s) between Gemma and half-brothers Michael and Anthony brings enlightenment of the toil of war. It was during the Council of Nicea that the Bible as we know it was formed, and the 'lesser' Gospels were dropped. The old worship was of Jesus being the Son of God, following Jesus' TEACHINGS and how He told us to live, with ourselves, and our fellow man. The Council of Nicea seems to have created a fixed religion with ritual. Women's roles were dramatically lessened. As for the role of women in the early church - Women had equal power in the early church - there were of course the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdeline, and there were annointed Deaconesses who had equal power to convey the word and work of Jesus - this book tried to show through the ancient texts found the old Church's equality between woman and man. This book starts a little slow, but you get caught up in it, and you'll be glad for it because you will be thinking about the ideas for a while after.

I loved this book, not only for what I learned, but for how it made me want to know more. It is an amazing and redemptive story -- and worth reading for the writing and the love story alone. It was almost eery, after reading this novel which explores the complex and capricious way that history is written, to read David Marshall's review attacking Malarkey's facts. The fact is, these "facts" are largely a matter of opinion. There are many Christian schools and many Christian scholars with many points of view. I've read enough of them to know there is no definitive story. Faith is personal and Mr. Marshall, with his protests, shows this clearly enough. How can he simply dismiss Elaine Pagels as "one of the greatest sources of disinformation about early Christianity on the planet?" Like Bishop Iranaeus, he really does protest too much.

In 1947 London, Bernard Westerly visits nurse Gemma Bastian asking her if her internationally famous archeologist father Charles sent her any packages for "safekeeping". She says no. Two mornings later the telex arrives from Cairo informing her that her dad died and that money has been sent for her to come to Cairo to bury his ashes. In Cairo, she heads to the house of Professor David Lezar, a colleague of her father. However, though he and others try to divert her from her father's last work, Gemma needs to see what he was dong. Soon she begins to suspect he was murdered perhaps by his friends. Finally trusting no one even the sons of David whom she is attracted to, Gemma learns that Charles' last project was finding the lost Gnostic Gospel written by Mary Magdalene with an emphasis on her relationship with Jesus; something the Church wants interred at any cost. Giving credit to Elaine Pagels (see THE GNOSTIC GOSPELS) and embellishing on a real discovery just after WWII, Tucker Malarkey writes a terrific Christian thriller that will hook the Brownian crowd and others from start to finish. The action-packed story line focuses on the discovery of ancient texts that could shake the foundation of organized western religions especially Christianity as Gemma begins to believe that Mary Magdalene was the first gospel. Her need to know what happened to her father and what he found on his final project make for a thrilling read as fans will consider what if in the first century AD. Harriet Klausner

This is a story about greed, ambition, misogyny, and human nature. Set against the confusing clarity of war, this story takes place between the end of WWII and the beginning of the Arab-Israeli Conflict in 1948. British nurse, Gemma Bastian receives two letters from her Egyptologist father. One letter is full of exciting news of riches and the promise of a new home in Egypt, far away from war-torn London, while the other is addressed to both Gemma and a man she has never met. Shortly after receiving those letters she finds out that her father has died under mysterious circumstances. Gemma travels to Egypt to figure out what happened to her father and why mysterious and threatening men seem to be very interested in his findings. The main plot in the story has to do with the controversial papyri, known as the Gnostic Gospels, found in Egypt, that are believed to be the lost gospels from apostles of Jesus Christ, including the gospels of Mary Magdalene. This is a fictionalized account of how they disappeared and why they remained hidden for nearly 30 years after their discovery. Resurrection purports that the bible is a case of the winners writing history and eliminating ideas that they did not agree with, namely the role of women and the church in religion. Resurrection is a thought provoking page turner that makes you question the nature of organized religion. Anyone who was interested in the questions raised in the Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, but disappointed by the story, will love Resurrection. This book is what The Da Vinci Code could have been if you took out all of the excessive cross-Europe chases and biblical dynasties. There are no secretive, evil religious organizations. No creepy albino monks lurking about after the main characters. Resurrection is a suspenseful love story peopled with a mix of fictional and historical characters. Tucker Malarkey's characters are a bit wooden, but they are (perhaps inadvertently) secondary to the intriguing religious debate. She has created a wonderful fiction based on the sketchy history of the Gnostic Gospels.