Covenant

A Novel

By: Dean Crawford

Narrated by: George Geist

Debut author Dean Crawford drops an explosive thriller on the reading public with Covenant, a much-talked-about work that’s won its author comparisons to Michael Crichton and James Rollins.

After uncovering a 7,000-year-old tomb housing alien remains, archaeologist Lucy Morgan is abducted - and then all hell breaks loose as the world careens toward a horrifying apocalypse.

©2011 Dean Crawford (P)2011 Recorded Books, LLC

Critic reviews

“Get the cameras rolling - Indiana Jones meets Alien. What a combination of mystery, suspense, and unspeakable horror. I loved it!” (R.L. Stine)

"With scarily realistic science, earth-shattering intrigue and hyperdrive action, Covenant marks the launch of a major new talent in the thriller world.” (Scott Mariani, author of The Mozart Conspiracy)

Once more around the Tomb with Lucy!

Ok this is a quick review. If you like "lucky" Lucy Jacobs and her ongoing antics in antiquity ( and I do ) then you will dig this fast moving action adventure.
Kind of have to be into the genre though. Nothing really new here per se, but a good listen while you grill.

Enjoy.

Good, but could have been better...

I generally do not write reviews of other author???s works unless they rise to the level of exceptional or are so horrible that I feel compelled to save a potential reader/buyer both time and money. In the case of this story, I feel that it hits somewhere in the middle, with needle leaning north of mediocre.

First off, the storyline is well thought out, plotted and executed. The premise is both current and gripping. The story-telling is good and aside from very short chapters (I suspect an editor???s influence in that), the story and plotlines weave and progress smoothly. Technically, the story is well done, and the prose is very good and visual. I do feel that the author needs to research (and get into the regional minds) his characters better.

I was taught as a young writer that an author has an obligation to both entertain and inform the reader. Storytelling is an entertainment medium and within the story, information (hopefully something new or enlightening) is imparted to the reader/listener. However, when an author uses the storytelling medium to impart or promote an agenda, or relates his/her personal bias, then the medium of storytelling is perverted into a tool for propaganda and as such is more likely to offend than entertain. Storytelling is also a deliberate art. The author either deliberately seeks to entertain or he seeks to deliberately offend. It seems to me that this author has sought to squeeze both into this debut novel.

Simply from reading this story, it is obvious that the author holds the following ???personal??? views:
1. Christianity in particular and religion in general, is mere myth, and all sincerely faithful people are narrow-minded and myopic; and science is the only answer to man???s quest for truth.
2. Israel is evil, and the Palestinian cause is just. I won???t begin to discuss the author???s apparent view of America or ???The American Dream.???
3. All conservatives are evil, with evil motives in all they do.

Now, I merely point this out because I feel that the mark of a really good author is the ability to tell a good story from any POV without allowing his/her ???personal??? views to interfere with the story, let alone be evident. This story could have been extremely good had the author kept his personal views in his pocket and simply related the story from the character???s POV and not force his characters to tell the story from his. (If I were one of his characters, I???d sue him for wrongful intellectual imprisonment.) As it is, if you hold ANY religious values as dear, you WILL be sorely offended as you progress through this story. Likewise, if you are Jewish or an Israeli, you too will find reason to be offended here as the author has failed to relate a good story that is free from the author???s personal bias.

On the other hand, if you are purely secular, and agree with current pop-political analysis, you should find this story just fine.