Description: Everyone dies once. But what if a chosen few were raised from the dead?
Two thousand years ago Jesus resurrected his friend, Lazarus, who founded a secret organization: SOAR. Since then Jesus has added to the resurrected—The Awakened—to aid Lazarus in SOAR's battle against Satan's slaves, the UnVeilers. The threat is escalating. The UnVeilers have stepped up their attacks on mankind through a charming leader and a devastating series of bombings in Dubai and Tel Aviv.
But the invasion doesn't stop with international terrorism. The UnVeilers are searching for a secret that Jesus embedded in Lazarus’ journal that not even Lazarus knows—and it will determine the fate of mankind. After a failed cyber-attack against SOAR's computers, Lazarus and his team of experts must find the secret before the UnVeilers do. What clue is he overlooking that could turn the tide of this ageless conflict?
The souls fighting with Lazarus are weary, but the war against evil is far from won. Can Lazarus and his team set aside their longing for heaven and put a stop to these satanic attacks before it's too late?
My Thoughts: The first thing I thought of when reading the description of this novel was Robert Liparulo's Immortal Files. The concept of certain people from the Bible living forever is an engaging one for me, especially in learning why those people were chosen to live forever. However, Spillman does reveal this early on in the story, taking away some of that mystery.
The tale is told some what in two parts. There is the main story of SOAR in the modern day, combating UD's and stopping terrorism, and then there are the journal entries which start just before Lazarus' death and follow his life after. These journal entries were my favorite part. Seeing the world through the eyes of someone who had experienced heaven but couldn't remember was almost like reading a Biblical fiction novel, which is one of my favorite genre's to read.
However, I did have problems with parts of the rest of the story. There were a lot of point of view characters, some of which I think could have been done without. Some of the smaller POV characters I would forget about until their scenes came around again, and it made it difficult to keep track of some of what was going on. There were also places where certain things about the organizations were described rather vaguely.
The Awakened is definitely an interesting read, and for those who enjoy international thrillers with large casts, this is great. Though the first few chapters were slow as I eased into the story, I'm glad I was able to enjoy the concept of Lazarus and many others living until Christ returns.
I have provided an honest review after having received an ecopy of the book through the author.
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