I recently finished two novels that I was surprised had some significant similarities but yet wildly different takes. I thought it might be good to talk a little about the two, and in particular, to warn against one of them.
The two novels in question are M.R. Leonard’s Pilgrims and Douglas Preston and Aletheia Preston’s Paradox. Both are the debut novels for an author (Leonard and Aletheia, the daughter of Douglas). Both have connections with the question about life on other planets. Both have connections to the Catholic Church. Everything else, past this paragraph is major spoilers, because that is the only way to discuss them further. So, if you’re interested in reading them, but don’t want to be spoiled, stop at this paragraph. I will just say this summation: I have already recommended Pilgrims to others; I will never recommend Paradox to anyone.
In Pilgrims,
humanity has been preparing for an alien invasion for 5 years, since the first
sign of them approaching Earth. The main
character is a Latin teacher, Austin DeSantis, who loses his job and is desperate
for money. When the aliens arriving,
hovering in ships over major cities, the world is shocked when they start
speaking in Latin. The government forces
Austin to act as an interpreter, or face death for being an accomplice to
murder.
The aliens, it turns out, are Catholic, hence the Latin. Austin becomes a pawn of the US government, who want to use him to infiltrate the aliens, gain their friendship, then bring them down. He, reluctantly, becomes friends with one of the aliens and a Catholic priest-astronomer who has also been chosen to visit the alien spaceship.
Why do the aliens speak Latin? Why are they Catholic? Thousands of years ago, through their intellect they came to know that there was a God, but they didn’t know Him until they visited Earth and witnessed Jesus’ Passion, death, Resurrection, and ascension. When they share their “videos” with the world as proof, Muslims nuke the Vatican, killing the pope. In retaliation, the aliens completely wipeout every non-Christian in Saudi Arabia. In an attempt to stop the aliens, the priest agrees to celebrate Mass on the spaceship, allowing them to receive Jesus.
Lots more happens, but in the end, the world is saved, and Austin is on the path to conversion. It’s a compelling story, and deeply Catholic. My minor qualms come down to how the priest celebrates Mass on the spaceship. I’m also not entirely convinced that it is a “sci-fi retelling of Augustine’s Confessions.” It is much more of a “thinking” sci-fi, with not much action. But for what it is, it is interesting, it keeps the reader engaged, and, as I said, I have already recommended it to others. (An aside: a non-Catholic actually recommended it to me, which was interesting)
The other novel
I just finished reading is Paradox, a sequel to Extinction, which
I read last year. Extinction was
not quite the updated Jurassic Park that some reviewers claimed, but I
still found it interesting and I wanted to see what happened next with the
Neanderthals on the loose.
There’s a lot
going on in Paradox, but the “Neanders” are nowhere to be found, except
as an occasional reference to the previous book. Essentially, an exobiologist breaks into a
church in Rome, steals part of the skull of St. John the Baptist, and an Irish
monk is sent to America to bring it back.
Meanwhile, an eccentric prospector and UFO conspiracy theorist is found
murdered in his cabin in Colorado (which brings in the main characters, Cash
and Colcord, from Extinction).
Where do I begin with how this novel upset me? First, there is the “trans” reporter who is referred to as “they/them,” making it almost impossible to follow scenes with her because of the stupid plural referring to singular. So, it’s woke. Second, there is the problem with the Catholic Church. The murderers use Inquisition torture methods, because of course the Inquisition is evil. They also kill two of the characters who are Catholic by stuffing them with the Eucharist, you know, as Viaticum (oh, and by the way, at the end of the book a female character performs the “Last Rites,” because the authors didn’t bother to actually research anything). Then there is the small-town priest who is portrayed as evil because he prefers the Latin Mass and says that people misunderstand the Inquisition. Never mind that, in the end, he helps save Cash and Colcord, he still is seen as a crazy person not to be trusted.
Then there is the realization at the end of the novel that “upends everything people think they know about religion.” You see, Jesus and his apostles (which apparently include John the Baptist?) were all aliens. So, he wasn’t really God, just an alien with super powers. I’m all for science fiction and interesting stories, but I draw the line at blasphemy. In an Afterword, the authors try to explain it all as a fun little theory that some people have, but they also scoff at such theories being a threat to the Church. It’s all a fiction account, after all, no harm done. I’m glad it makes it easy for me to say I will never read another book from Douglas Preston again.
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