The Resurrectionist

Thomas F. Monteleone

Warner Books. $19.95
(paper $6.50)

Thomas Flanagan is a slimeball senator. When a plane crash leaves his friend Larry dead and Flanagan with the ability to bring him back, nothing will ever be the same. Everyone wants Flanagan, from the doctors who examined the resurrected Larry, to the Vatican, to the most secret and ugly mechanisms of the US government.

The Resurrectionist is full of unexpected twists (except for the painfully predictable football game) but never rises above the conventional adventure and intrigue of an "action packed" movie. The ending is particularly weak and unsatisfactory, resorting to an out-of-the-blue, deus ex machina revelation

Nevertheless, The Resurrectionist is fast and tense, with little extraneous padding. Monteleone's skill as a writer shows, despite his flawed plot, in poetic phrases such as "she even hated [herself] for having the hubris to have ever believed she was strong enough to labor under the shadow of Caduceus." This is not enough to redeem the book, but it comes close.

 

This review copyright 1996 by Wendy Morris

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