No friends its not an April Fool’s day joke. In fact you’d be a fool not to take advantage of the offer I am alerting you to today. All four of the Art West thrillers are on Kindle now, and all are for sale for as low as $5.99. Yes, you read that right. Gift them to friends, for summer beach reading, or birthday presents. And yes, the fifth novel is in the works—– here below is a little taste….
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CHAPTER ONE: A LONG NIGHT’S JOURNEY INTO DAY
August had turned into September and there was now some relief from the extreme heat of summer in Charlotte N.C. Art and his fiancée Marissa had settled into a comfortable routine at 4422 Sharonview Road, staying with Art’s Mom, Joyce, and her lodger, Jake Arafat, the budding basketball star for the Charlotte Bobcats. While there was not yet a hint of Fall in the air, nevertheless it was cool enough on the back porch to enjoy sitting in the shade, sipping some sweet tea, enjoying the intoxicating smell of the giant star magnolia in the yard and slowly talking through the day. Art could not remember the last time he had spent five weeks in a row in Charlotte with nothing pressing to do, and he was genuinely and surprisingly enjoying being a man at rest.
Come mid-September he would begin lecturing at Duke on archaeology and the Bible as the Moody Smith Visiting Professor of Bible, but for now he was a gentleman of leisure. He only sporadically left his cell phone on, he only checked his email once a day, and somehow he had been able to not get fidgety. It was not at all like him. He attributed it to his fiancé, Marissa who had had a profound calming effect on him. Joyce West had noticed the change this attractive olive skinned Turkish woman archaeologist had brought about in Art’s life, and she was grateful. She had convinced herself long ago that Art was too married to his work to ever find a living soul to love, but then serendipity happened and no one was more pleased than Joyce. Mentally she was already thinking about the wedding….and grandchildren!
“Soooo, your thinking maybe the wedding will be next summer Marissa?’ asked Joyce carefully as she sipped her tea while sitting in the old rocker on the back porch.
Marissa smiled at Joyce, and elbowed Art in the ribs, making him sit up and pay attention. “Yes I’ve been talking to my parents, and they think next June will work well. There really is no suitable place to have it in Ankara, so I was thinking Istanbul where most of our relatives live and where there is a fairly significant Christian population.”
For some reason Joyce had been hoping the couple liked Charlotte so much that they would decide to have the wedding in the Queen City, and so she sighed, realizing that was too much to hope for, especially since the bride and her family were doing the lion’s share of the planning. Just when Joyce was about to ask four more questions, the phone in the kitchen rang and rang, and rang with an insistence that could not be ignored. Finally, Art jumped up and trotted into the kitchen and picked up the phone.
“Hello? West residence.”
“May I please speak with Art West? It’s urgent.”
“Art speaking, may I ask who’s calling please?”
“This is Charlie Miller, you’re old seminary classmate and fellow Bible teacher. Art, I have been involved in a dig in Rome this summer on the back side of the Vatican, which has produced some surprising, some would say shocking results, and I need both some advice and some help.”
Immediately this conversation had Art’s full attention. Charlie and Art had finished one-two in their seminary class and Charlie had gone on to Yale to do a top drawer degree in the Bible and archaeology, studying under Wayne Meeks and others. His specialty was social archaeology, that is the archaeology of ordinary life— homes, families, economic realities of plebians, and like.
“What is it that has set your radar off?” asked Art, his right leg beginning to jiggle with excitement as he sat down in a kitchen chair and crossed his legs.
“I’ve found a grave, and not just an ordinary grave either, but the grave of a saint and his family, all buried together in a single cave, not far underground.”
“O.K. so far I’m interested but not jumping up and down. Who do you think this saint is?”
“The names we have been able to decipher so far are as follows. I am going to read you the inscription— HIC IACET ANDRONICUS ET JUNIA APOSTOLI CHRISTI.
Marissa was startled first by the outcry emanating from the kitchen, and then the sound of the phone hitting the floor. Running into the kitchen she said “What is it Art? Why do you look like you just saw a ghost?”
Art was too mesmerized to answer, and stooping over and picking up the phone he said, “You are telling me you found the tomb of Andronicus and Junia, Paul’s co-workers, and that this couple’s epitaph includes reference to their both being apostles?”
“That’s exactly right,” replied Charlie, “but I haven’t told you the best part. The inscription on the ossuary itself goes on to say that this Junia was originally one of Jesus’ own female disciples in Galilee.”
“Holy smokes! The Jewish equivalent of Junia is of course Joanna and a few NT scholars have conjectured there might be a connection, but it looks like you may have the living proof! Now I am really pumped. But it sounds like you have already made this landmark discovery, why would you need me?”
“There are several problems. I haven’t told a soul but you about this. We only got the initial phase of the dig complete this week and have done all the photography and cataloguing of the four ossuaries here, but I am thinking this will not merely come as a surprise but a shock to many in the Vatican, especially since this tomb is directly beneath the back wall of the Vatican.
“My fear is that someone will try to bury this tomb and its remarkable contents, rather than reveal to the world there were women apostles, the top echelon of leadership in the early church. I am equally afraid of what will happen to the dig if I simply go to the rabid press here, who are always looking for ways to tweak the nose of the Catholic authorities in Rome. The dig is not technically on Vatican soil, but the back of the cave is in fact beyond the imaginary line of the wall and so under and thus within Papal territory. That is, it is partially in two different sovereign states. We have dug under the Italian authority of the Ministry of Culture here. The site was discovered as they were putting in a new sewer line down the middle of the road behind the tourist entrance at the back door of the Vatican. A further complicating factor is that I became a Roman Catholic a couple of years ago.”
“What happens if there is a jurisdictional dispute over the artifacts? What happens if the Vatican claims the ossuaries as holy relics, since at least one of them was in fact over the line and into Papal territory? What happens if the Vatican appeals to my loyalty to mother church? I’m over my head here. And you know people here Art, I really don’t. You have connections. Could you come and help me with this on a short term consultative basis? Oh yes, and one more thing. There are several small hand lamps in the tomb with fish symbols on them. I am not sure why they are there in the first place, and the fish symbols on the top of the lamps surprised me as well? Were Christian already making their own lamps in the first century? Do you know anyone who is an expert in first century hand lamps? The dating of the lamps could help us confirm the dating of the human remains.”
With Marissa sitting right beside him and rubbing his back as she heard and saw the excitement building in Art’s frame, Art said “I would definitely like to do that, but I need to talk to my fiancé first. Fortunately she is right here. I’m putting the phone down for a moment.” The words came spilling out at ninety miles a minute.
“Honey, its Charlie Miller, the archaeologist on the phone. He wants me to come to Rome for a short while, and here’s why— he seems to have found the tomb of the first Christian power couple— Andronicus and Junia, and they are both clearly identified as apostles on the lintel over the tomb door!! As you might imagine, this find is going to create a sensation in Rome when it is announced, and Charlie is in over his head. He’s a shy person, never has had to really deal with the media or ecclesiastical big wigs either, and he wants me to consult. What do you think?”
“I think you should go, for a week or so, and I will stay here and continue to get acquainted with your Mom, and make wedding plans. I think you should go on this short adventure by yourself, so you have my blessing to go.” Art smiled at his beautiful bride to be, gave her a quick kiss, and turned back to his phone conversation.
“Charlie I just got clearance from my secretary of the calendar, and I will do my best to get on a plane tonight out of Charlotte. I’ll call you later today when I have details if you will just give me your cell number. Go ahead and arrange for someone to pick me up at Leonardo da Vinci, since that airport is well out of town, and you need to guard your amazing find. And I will call my antiquities expert.”
Hanging up the phone and kissing Marissa again on the cheek he said, “Thanks honey, this is important, no doubt and I should call Father Saltalamaccia at the Vatican and let him know I am coming and I will need to talk with him in due course. We have to tell some trusted insider at the Vatican about what has been found.”
Immediately picking up the phone again, Art dialed his One Source Delta rep to book a flight. The time for lying on the couch was suddenly over, and Art was excited to be back on the case!
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