Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Ian Caldwell has written my favorite novel of the year - "The Fifth Gospel" sets a high water mark for intellectual thrillers not through its ingenious mystery/solution, but also through its thorough exploration of the complex interplay between faith and truth. "The Fifth Gospel" will surely be compared to Dan Brown's juggernaut, "The Da Vinci Code." Both novels delve into the deepest mysteries of the Catholic Church and Christian belief - Brown takes on the Holy Grail, while Caldwell focuses on the Shroud of Turin. But while Brown writes a perfect airplane book, focusing on short chapters revolving around taut action scenes seasoned with some enjoyable tidbits and arcana about the Grail, Caldwell has written a less thrilling but infinitely more emotionally powerful novel . . . which somewhat paradoxically makes it more thrilling. Caldwell surpasses Brown in one key area - while Brown's hero, Professor Langdon, is an emotional cipher who's really there to solve clues and get into scrapes, Caldwell's protagonist is a simple man of the cloth who gets under your skin and stays there. Father Alex Andreou is an unusual man in many respects - he is a Greek Catholic priest working in the Vatican. Greek Catholic priests are allowed to marry, and Father Andreou has a young son, Peter. Yet he is working in the Vatican, where the Roman Catholic priests have slightly different obligations in the area of celibacy. So he's an outlier, but he's nevertheless a popular instructor of the Gospels. Father Andreou and Peter are struggling, as Alex's wife Mona abandoned them a few years ago in a fit of depression. Raising a son as a single parent in the Vatican is a unique experience, to say the least. Despite these domestic struggles, in the opening chapters, he is called on a dark and stormy night by his brother, Simon, whom he finds standing over the dead body of Ugo Nogara. This is troubling, not only because Simon and Ugo were extremely close, but also because Ugo had been working like mad to open an exhibit on the Shroud of Turin that threatens to blow the socks off all those who see it. For those who don't recall, the Shroud of Turin is the legendary funeral cloth of Jesus - it bears a likeness of a crucified man who has an uncanny resemblance to the popular understanding of what Jesus looked like. However, a few years ago, carbon dating appeared to dash any hopes that it was actually Jesus's burial shroud - the cloth was reported to be several hundred years too young. But Ugo claimed to be able to explain that problem, which was explosive enough, but he also claimed that the Shroud had other more powerful lessons to teach. And so Father Andreou gets caught up in both a murder investigation and an exploration of what Ugo had discovered about the Shroud. What follows is a deep exploration of the meaning of the Gospels, where to look for legend and where to look for fact, and a deeper understanding of the schism between the Catholic and Orthodox churches. Caldwell has done his research, but this book is never boring. What is refreshing about "The Fifth Gospel" is the depth of the faith of all the parties involved. In our modern, cynical age, we all too often dismiss the Church and its officials as obsolete at best, power-seeking conservative hypocrites at worst. Caldwell's characters are men and women of deep faith, conviction, and intellect, and without the undying support of their faith in God and the Church none of them would make it through the novel's crisis unscathed. All the action builds to a fantastic climax of discovery, confession, and forgiveness at the very center of modern Catholicism. I can't recommend this novel highly enough - and a perfect holiday read.