The Bible of the Dead [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

If you're looking at this book and expecting a read along the lines of Dan Brown or James Rollins, look elsewhere. While Knox does try to expand on the wildly popular idea of the anthropological thriller, he fails to deliver the compulsive read his fellow authors have managed to bring to the table.

Now I do have to give credit where it's due. Rather than attempt to bring out the same ideas that have already been well trod, Knox manages to find a historical mystery that nobody seems to have written about yet: the Hands of Gargas and the Plain of Jars, two fascinating anthropological and social finds that are woefully underused in the world of fiction. In this aspect, Knox did a good job since these are things that would make for a good anthropological/sociological thriller.

However, where Knox flounders is in his penchant for overstating to the point of tedium. We're given themes, histories, and info dumps, which I admit are unavoidable in any book, but we're browbeaten by these elements until we're rolling our eyes at the occasionally overly dramatic and unnecessary prose. A good example would be how Knox uses the horrific atrocities that the Khmer Rouge made against the people of Cambodia. These elements are stated time and time again, occasionally at the expense of character development. We're told how communism is bad and how horrible the Khmer Rouge was, meanwhile the main characters seem to be little more than a platform for these views. While these viewpoints are valid, they just kept me from getting as invested in the characters as I'd wanted to be. That the plot jumps between different groups of characters doesn't help out either.

Then there's the ending. I won't elaborate, but I'll just say that the message in the end will be controversial to some readers. If it wasn't as subtle as Gallagher smashing a watermelon, Knox could have gotten away with it to where I don't believe anyone would have complained. Sometimes less is more and a briefer revelation with less exclamation would have driven the point in more than pages of exposition. It just diluted everything and made it more overzealous and annoying than thought provoking, making the ending (and the book in general) more of a chore to read than a joy.

Now, it isn't all bad. There are some good scenes in here and the general idea of the book is pretty darn intriguing. If Knox could have gone back and eased up on the overstating of ideas and focused more on the character development, this would have been an amazing read. It could have had at least 40-60 pages shaved off to make a tighter narrative. It's just that the book failed to deliver on its promise and while it might make for an OK library read, Knox still has a long way to go before he gets to Douglass and Preston levels.

1.7 out of 5 stars

(ARC provided by Netgalley)

The Lost Goddess starts out interestingly enough, with an archaeological discovery in a French cave, followed by a mysterious assault in the dying artificial light deep underground. For me, that opening scene was the highlight of the novel, which is a definite problem - that level of tension and suspense is simply never recaptured anywhere else within the story. A lot of the action seemed to be mere padding, such as the extended tangent of police chases and family squabbles that nearly brought the middle of the book to a halt.

What I had hoped would be a fun archaeological adventure (akin to Matthew Reilly), though, and was even willing to accept as yet another pale imitation of Dan Brown, simply got bogged down by way more religious fanaticism and politics than I cared to wade through.

Where it completely lost my interest was with its heavy-handed approach in equating 'faith' with all that is good and pure in the world, and 'atheism' with all that is evil and cruel. There is actually a line towards the end of the novel where one of the characters calls atheism "a form of dementia . . . a mental illness."

It's a shame, because the Hands of Gargas and the Plain of Jars are definitely unique MacGuffins to explore, and there are hints of competent writing here. If only the the history hadn't been wasted in info-dumps, and then overshadowed by the social/political commentary and religious fanaticism, it could have been an average thriller.

All-in-all, a rather disappointing read, and an author I certainly don't care to revisit.

This is the first of Tom Knox's books I've read, unfortunately, and after reading the reviews for the Lost Goddess on the cover I was double checking to make sure I was reading the same book as the other reviewers.

Reading it is like walking through a muddy field, with each step coating your shoes to the point where you can't walk anymore. It was like work, and I've gotten more pleasure out of college textbooks. About a third of the way through I was going to chuck it, but it was going so badly that it was like watching a schlocky horror movie, where you want to keep going to see just how bad it gets.

His attempts at dialogue for the Asian characters' pidgin English is stereotypical at best, downright insulting at worst. I kept getting this vision of Jerry Lewis, eyes squinted shut, wearing one of those rice paddy straw hats. It was awful.

His plot, which sounds intriguing, goes off the rails in a hurry. Sorry, but this book was truly a stinker.