The Last Secret of the Temple-Paul Sussman

The Last Secret of the Temple
Paul Sussman
Atlantic Monthly, Oct 2007, $24.00
ISBN: 9780871139726

Hotel owner Jan Weiss is found dead at the archeological site at Malqata, Egypt. Luxor Police Inspector Yusuf Khalifa leads the official inquiry. As he digs into the victim’s history, Yusaf sees an eerie similarity to the vicious murder of an Israeli woman at Karnak years ago. His gut told him the wrong person was executed for that homicide, but until now he had no proof.

His superiors tell Yusaf to back off from the Israeli angle while he also has doubts about cooperation with Israeli officials. Still he goes with his stomach and reopens the previously solved case. No nonsense Jerusalem detective Arieh Ben Roi is assigned to work with the Egyptian.

Meanwhile in Jerusalem journalist Eva Town still glows from her recent interview of Palestinian extremist “Al-Mulassam” when she receives a note offering her a scoop in exchange for arranging a meeting with Al-Mulassam. There separate investigations soon converge over a biblical artifact dating back to Holy Temple, circa AD 70, that could lead to World War III starting in the Middle East where symbolism supersedes substance.

This is an exciting police procedural that soon spins into a dangerous scenario in which the end of days may be beginning if the two cops fail with their changing mission. The story line is at its best as an investigative tale in which neither the Egyptian nor the Israel has any real support from their superiors nor trusts the other. When the plot spins into preventing the regional contagion from occurring, it picks ups suspense and action, but loses some plausibility in the process. Still Paul Sussman provides an exhilarating thriller based on the premise that if it has a religious connotation it means war.

Harriet Klausner