Tuesday, May 31, 2011

The Knowledge of Good and Evil-Glenn Kleier

The Knowledge of Good and Evil
Glenn Kleier
Tor, Jul 19 2011, $24.99
ISBN 9780765323774

Survivor guilt though he was only a child when his parents’ died in a tragic plane crash years ago, Ian Baringer has spent the next couple of decades trying to contact them. Currently the former priest skeptically believes in the afterlife though his hope is weakening with years of failure to achieve his obsession. He works on the talk show Probing the Paranormal as an investigator while his lover agnostic psychiatrist Dr. Angela Weber is the show’s host.

Finally reaching a breaking point where he needs to know either way, the OCD Ian decides to prove the soul survives the body dying by experiencing a near death incident. A shocked Angela who loves the troubled Ian pleads with him to no avail. Determined, he will prove the theory either way, but soon finds the secretive Ordo Arma Christi brothers want him dead before he conducts the experiment as this Order believe they must prevent Ian from biting the apple.

This thought provoking exhilarating thriller asks many questions about religious dogma, but is not limited to the afterlife as Glenn Kleier questions contradictions for instance between free will and forbidden fruits of knowledge. Ian is the key to the plot, as he suffers from survivor induced obsessive compulsive behavior that has worsened in reaction to his beliefs shrinking. Angelia is a loyal wonderful person who refuses to give up on the man she loves although she fears he is losing his mind to his obsession. The story line is fast-paced as the lead pair abruptly finds themselves being hunted by a cell who rejects the concept that man has the right to know anything about the afterlife.

Harriet Klausner

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