Book 23 of 2012, is on of the books that I picked up in Williamsburg several weeks ago, The Moses Expedition by Juan Gomez-Jurado. From the book cover of the book:
After fifty years in hiding, the Nazi war criminal known as the Butcher of Spiegelgrund has finally been found, and with him the candle covered filigree gold that was stolen from a Jewish family. But it isn’t the gold that Father Anthony Fowler,a C.I.A. operative and the Vatican’s secret service, is seeking. As he holds the flame to wax, the candle unveils the missing fragment of an ancient map that reveals the location of the Ten Commandments tablets.
Soon Father Fowler is part of a mission financed by a recluse American billionaire to the desert of Jordan to discover the tablets. Accompanying him is journalist Andrea Otero, whose life Fowler saved in Gomez-Jurardo’s début novel God’s Spy. But not everybody wants the tablets found, including a terrorist group whose leader is hidden within the members of the mission, waiting for the moment to strike!
Juan Gomez-Jurado’s work has been published in more than forty countries and while this is my first of his books I’ve read, it will not be the last. It was a page turner for me. I enjoyed the characters and the history woven into the story. I think I would have prefered to have started with God’s Spy just to know the history between Father Fowler and Otero, but I will go back and catch-up before moving on to Gomez-Jurado’s latest The Traitor’s Emblem. Here’s what some others have to say about the book:
“A true masterpiece. A brilliant thriller-sharp, suspenseful, and engrossing” – Brad Thor
“Settle back and savor this perfect piece of entertainment” – Steve Berry.
“A perfectly balanced, fast-paced, and compiling thriller” – Booklist, starred review
So check it out! As for me, I’ve moved on to Book 24 of 2012 – Bleed For Me – from Michael Robotham! (I’m almost back to 3 books per month!)
