"Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested." (Francis Bacon)

Saturday, November 20, 2021

36 Righteous Men

TITLE: 36 Righteous Men
AUTHOR: Steven Pressfield

This is a page-turner, partly due to the story and partly due to the writing style used by the author. Dialogue is presented script-style and the overall narrative reads like a police report, which it mostly is, being told by Dewey, a junior detective in 2034 New York City. Climate change has reached crisis-level and now someone is killing environment activists in New York as well as other locations across the globe. Dewey and her older partner Manning are assigned to the taskforce investigating the murders. The killer leaves no trace behind, other than a mysterious mark between the victims' eyes that can be seen only after the skin is pulled back during an autopsy. A mysterious woman provides a clue that sets Manning and Dewey off on an investigative direction that puts them at odds with their supervisor. The deaths seem connected, according to the woman's info, to the Jewish myth of the 36 Righteous Men -- their identities hidden -- whose existence is keeping God from destroying humanity. Now, it seems, some supernatural creature has identified them and is killing them to bring about Armageddon. 

The urgency to keep the remaining righteous men alive is matched by a global ecosystem spiraling out of control. The sections dealing with excessive heat and storms feel all too real. The story might be fiction, but it's a cautionary tale. This could be our future, perhaps sooner than Pressfield assumed.

No comments:

Post a Comment