Review: The Gospel of Damascus

The Gospel of Damascus by Omar Imady

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Book Info: Genre: Spiritual/Religious fiction
Reading Level: Adult
Recommended for: Fans of apocalyptic fiction, esp. relating to traditional religious thoughts on it

My Thoughts: This was a very strange book. While Yune is Muslim, the book itself seems to embrace all spiritual paths, which I actually appreciated. So often these sorts of things end up promoting one path over all others. Anyway, the synopsis gives a fairly concise description of the story, and there is not much else to say other than that. The characters are just there to move the story along, so there isn't much in the way of character development other than broad strokes, and the story itself is more about the journey than anything else. It sometimes moves years within the course of a paragraph. It was a fairly interesting story, but not a traditional one.

Disclosure: I received a copy of this book from the LibraryThing Early Reviewer's Program in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Synopsis: The Gospel of Damascus is an eschatological novel that weaves sacred traditions to tell the story of eight angels who identify and prepare Yune Bukhari, a Damascene man born to a Christian mother and Muslim father, to be one of the successors to the Disciples of Christ. The preparation process is complex and entails spiritual and sensual experiences which Yune must successfully undergo. Guiding the preparation process are golden scrolls which can only be opened at very specific dates. The story appears to culminate on Christmas Eve 1999 when Yune, along with his co-disciples, believe Christ will return. Yune is shattered when Christ fails to descend on the White Tower east of Damascus. But thirty-three years later, the preparation of Yune is over and he is finally permitted to witness the event he had anticipated for so long.



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