In this futuristic thriller, Anwar is a Consultant for an altered version of the United Nations. Consultants are referred to as the Dead, and he's not entirely human. We learn all this in the first few pages of EVENSONG. Anwar, who was born in New York, is given the job of bodyguard to a woman in England who is running a conference. There'll be security present, but nothing like Anwar.
EVENSONG is front-loaded with a lot of history, explaining the alterations that have taken place in society; how the New Anglicans got to be the world's fastest growing Church, and what's been happening to all the other religions; what changes have occurred in the UN and the new UNEX. Anwar can't start work before slogging through a martial arts tournament which comes across as a fighting computer game; he's up against all the other Dead consultants. When he meets the lady he's to guard, Olivia, Anwar right away has unromantic sex with her on the table. The Bodyguard it's not. The tone is masculine and adult with strong language and I found it hard to get into anyone's head.
The conference, which will be a summit, is in the traditional seaside town of Brighton, but held at the end of a two-mile long pier in the sea, which sounds like a bad place to be if the venue goes on fire. I did enjoy the descriptions of the engineering. Unusual settings for other parts of the story include hunting brown bears in Croatia, and a house built to mimic Frank Lloyd Wright's classic Fallingwater. The New Anglicans, with Olivia as their Archbishop, turn out to be both a corporation and a church, with an outreach foundation and a concern over access to water. A journalist at the summit asks how come energy shortages are almost a thing of the past, but water rights issues and shortages continue to dominate the news?
John Love has worked in the music industry for many years and lives near London. EVENSONG is his second science fiction book and he has added plenty of detail and action. I feel the book would suit a reader who enjoys reading thrillers about foiling one assassination attempt after another, shootings, bombings, corporate manipulations and treachery. Too much violence for me so I hope the future really doesn't turn out this way. Though John Love is on the money about the freshwater shortages.
A near-future thriller where those who protect humanity
are
not always completely human.
The future is a dangerous place. Keeping the world stable
and peaceful when competing corporate interests and
nation-states battle for power, wealth, and prestige has
only gotten harder over the years. But thatβs the United
Nationsβ job. So the UN has changed along with the rest of
the world. When the UNβs βsoftβ diplomacy fails, it has
harder options. Quiet, scalpel-like options: The
Deadβbiologically enhanced secret operatives created by
the
UN to solve the problems no one else can.
Anwar Abbas is one of The Dead. When the Controller-
General
of the UN asks him to perform a simple bodyguard mission,
heβs insulted and resentful: mere bodyguard work is a
waste
of his unique abilities. But he takes the job, because to
refuse it would be unthinkable.
Anwar is asked to protect Olivia del Sarto, the host of an
important upcoming UN conference. Olivia is head of the
worldβs fastest-growing church, but in her rise to power
she
has made enemies: shadowy enemies with apparently
limitless
resources.
Anwar is one of the deadliest people on earth, but her
enemies have something which kills people like him. And
theyβve sent it for her. Itβs out there, unstoppable and
untraceable, getting closer as the conference approaches.
As he and Olivia ignite a torrid affair, Anwar must
uncover
the conspiracy that threatens to destroy her, the UN, and
even The Dead.
No excerpt available.
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