About
Reviews
Search
Submit
Home

Mystery Books for Sale

[ Home ]
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]


  

THE JOSHUA STONE
by James Barney
William Morrow Paperbacks, October 2013
416 pages
$14.99
ISBN: 0062021397


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

At the beginning of James Barney's THE JOSHUA STONE we learn that a dreadful explosion destroyed a secret government lab in 1959. Over a half-century later, a famous physicist, long presumed dead in that lab, stumbles into a rural West Virginia coffee shop. He has a bullet wound in his abdomen and is raving in a German accent. His hair is wild and his fingernails are long and bizarrely curled. The tale of who is he and how he has appeared in this place and time lead the government to investigate a secret that they thought was long-buried. Mike Califano, a brilliant data-miner, is brought into the search. He is a loner with an antipathy toward following the dictates of authority. Together with government agent Ana Thorne he must uncover a conspiracy that threatens the entire world.

Meanwhile, a nefarious band of international businessmen and politicians, led by a vicious Russian mobster, has gathered to witness the abilities of a mysterious stone and listen to a Nobel-prize winning physicist describe how it works to produce energy. The power of this object is linked to the Bible, specifically to the cryptic force that allowed Joshua to cross the Jordan River at full flood. However, there are troubling side effects. Time itself, it seems, is disrupted by the effects of the "Joshua Stone." Long passages of the book explain the physics behind relativity and time and how time can be slower or faster depending on certain factors. Since the whole area of theoretical physics seems a bit like magic to the layman, all of the details seem plausible. We are thrust into the field of physics where science and religion and faith all seem to merge.

Another unkempt figure from the past, a man called Malachi, has also stumbled out of the lab, possibly through a connecting tunnel. Califano discovers the same tunnel and almost dies there. Agents of the criminal conspiracy are after the material that Malachi has stolen from the lab. Ukrainian goons, Califano and Thorne all converge on Malachi in a Scientology church in D.C. in a bloody confrontation, a partial escape via time warp, and then a car chase through the streets.There is more than one stone that the Russians are after, so the pursuit continues across the globe.

The author includes a quiz at the book's end, challenging the reader to separate fact from fiction. He maintains that the novel he has written is “true-ish.” For those who enjoy a scientific thriller with Biblical references and the clock ticking on human survival, James Barney's THE JOSHUA STONE will have much appeal.

Anne Corey is a writer, poet, teacher and botanical artist in New York's Hudson Valley.

Reviewed by Anne Corey, February 2014

[ Top ]


QUICK SEARCH:

 

Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
[ Home ]