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The Last Days of Jericho by Thomas Brookside
A monster is approaching the Bronze Age city of Yarich. It cannot be stopped. It cannot be turned aside. And the monster is…God Himself. Sakal, caravan-master to the "Melek" or king of the Canaanite city-state, recounts the tale of the increasingly desperate battle for survival waged by his people against fanatical outsiders – nomads from the desert wielding a terrible supernatural power. As an incomprehensible cosmic force approaches, the city dwellers slowly lose all that they have loved - including, finally, their humanity. A twist in point of view transforms the Old Testament tale of the fall of Jericho into Lovecraftian horror.
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First published June 25, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
September 12, 2020
I love it when a book does something new and original. I started this book with a fairly clear idea what to expect: a historical tragedy. An account of a doomed city with a hint of depravity, a lot of pathos, and perhaps some excitement. The story will be told in a highly dramatic style and feature either a morally-satisfying religious conclusion or a rationalized version of the Biblical story. Well we do get most of that, but that that’s not really what this is.
This is the Bible as horror story. I think when people think back on the Old Testament they generally have one of two reactions: either they completely accept the ineffable justice of God’s every command (in which case they’re beyond all help honestly, given the warcrimes and genocide He repeatedly demands) or they more-or-less ignore the religious aspect and focus on what it says about ancient culture. Well here we get the Biblical account as literal truth but presented from outside the perspective of the Hebrews. And it is terrifying.
Without doing injustice to the sources, God comes off here as more Lovecraftian horror than religious deity. Joshua and his band are not that dissimilar to the Cthulu cultists who feature everywhere in those stories and the powers of God are madness-inducing, if never quite as incomprehensibly alien as the Old Gods. And this stuff is all in the Bible: God’s command to slaughter all in Canaan and leave no person nor animal alive, God’s supernatural aid in carrying out said genocide, and the Arc of the Covenant serving as a sort of nuclear bomb of divine power. Seen from outside it’s terrifying and incomprehensible. And we really feel how cruel and nihilistic the whole thing is.
I was very impressed with the book’s efforts at accuracy as well. The entire premise of the book is fictitious: Jericho had been abandoned long before Joshua could have shown up (had he existed) and was much smaller than he depicts. But he acknowledges this in his author’s notes and if he knowingly gets Jericho wrong he still manages a very realistic account of Canaanite life in the late Bronze Age. The state-sponsored trade, the petty kings and their insecurities, the religious institutions, and the homely death and burial rituals all feel very much a part of the Bronze Age milieu. And that realism really makes the supernatural elements stand out in all their horror once they appear.
The only real complaint I have about this book is that it’s too short. Normally that’s not really a genuine complaint, but in this case the book really needed to be substantially longer. The whole story takes place in a little over 150 pages. That’s perhaps twice as long as a novella and half as long as a novel. You wouldn’t think a little thing like that would throw you, but it really does mess with the pacing. By the time you’re just starting to get into it the book is wrapping up. And the fact that we’re rushed right into the action doesn’t help either. A few chapters better establishing the world at peace and maybe one or two other aspects of what we’re seeing would have helped enormously.
But really, this is a great book. It’s one that will stick with me for quite a long time. Great ideas don’t come every day, and if the execution is a little flawed it is only a little. The prose is eminently readable and the characters well drawn. The tragic moments are truly heartbreaking and you walk away from the story with a very different perspective on the Biblical narrative. Highly recommended.
This is the Bible as horror story. I think when people think back on the Old Testament they generally have one of two reactions: either they completely accept the ineffable justice of God’s every command (in which case they’re beyond all help honestly, given the warcrimes and genocide He repeatedly demands) or they more-or-less ignore the religious aspect and focus on what it says about ancient culture. Well here we get the Biblical account as literal truth but presented from outside the perspective of the Hebrews. And it is terrifying.
Without doing injustice to the sources, God comes off here as more Lovecraftian horror than religious deity. Joshua and his band are not that dissimilar to the Cthulu cultists who feature everywhere in those stories and the powers of God are madness-inducing, if never quite as incomprehensibly alien as the Old Gods. And this stuff is all in the Bible: God’s command to slaughter all in Canaan and leave no person nor animal alive, God’s supernatural aid in carrying out said genocide, and the Arc of the Covenant serving as a sort of nuclear bomb of divine power. Seen from outside it’s terrifying and incomprehensible. And we really feel how cruel and nihilistic the whole thing is.
I was very impressed with the book’s efforts at accuracy as well. The entire premise of the book is fictitious: Jericho had been abandoned long before Joshua could have shown up (had he existed) and was much smaller than he depicts. But he acknowledges this in his author’s notes and if he knowingly gets Jericho wrong he still manages a very realistic account of Canaanite life in the late Bronze Age. The state-sponsored trade, the petty kings and their insecurities, the religious institutions, and the homely death and burial rituals all feel very much a part of the Bronze Age milieu. And that realism really makes the supernatural elements stand out in all their horror once they appear.
The only real complaint I have about this book is that it’s too short. Normally that’s not really a genuine complaint, but in this case the book really needed to be substantially longer. The whole story takes place in a little over 150 pages. That’s perhaps twice as long as a novella and half as long as a novel. You wouldn’t think a little thing like that would throw you, but it really does mess with the pacing. By the time you’re just starting to get into it the book is wrapping up. And the fact that we’re rushed right into the action doesn’t help either. A few chapters better establishing the world at peace and maybe one or two other aspects of what we’re seeing would have helped enormously.
But really, this is a great book. It’s one that will stick with me for quite a long time. Great ideas don’t come every day, and if the execution is a little flawed it is only a little. The prose is eminently readable and the characters well drawn. The tragic moments are truly heartbreaking and you walk away from the story with a very different perspective on the Biblical narrative. Highly recommended.
June 12, 2012
An incredible twist on Biblical history and extremely well handled. The pacing, storyline and characters were all very close to spot on. Unfortunately Brookside misses some opportunities for sub-plots and greater character delineation which take away a little from what is really an extremely good book. I'd recommend this to anyone looking for a good solid read.
November 25, 2020
The Dusty Men
The conquest of Canaan by the Hebrews from the perspective of the people of Jericho, this is a fascinating novel, which in its first half reads as a perfectly normal piece of historical fiction, and its second as a horrific fantasy. The narrative accepts for its own purposes the Biblical account of the fall of Jericho - the Dusty Men, the Hebrew army with its secret weapon, the ark of the Covenant and the lethal power of the Lord. The story aroused pity and fear in this reader, both signs of a well constructed tragedy. The novel's only flaw, its brevity.
The conquest of Canaan by the Hebrews from the perspective of the people of Jericho, this is a fascinating novel, which in its first half reads as a perfectly normal piece of historical fiction, and its second as a horrific fantasy. The narrative accepts for its own purposes the Biblical account of the fall of Jericho - the Dusty Men, the Hebrew army with its secret weapon, the ark of the Covenant and the lethal power of the Lord. The story aroused pity and fear in this reader, both signs of a well constructed tragedy. The novel's only flaw, its brevity.
September 16, 2022
What Happened
Great bible story from the opposite side. They were people to, who felt excitement and anguish regardless of their beliefs. This book brings that to life excellently. The character develops quickly as the story unfolds. Great writing and imagination to say how it looked from the opposite side.
Great bible story from the opposite side. They were people to, who felt excitement and anguish regardless of their beliefs. This book brings that to life excellently. The character develops quickly as the story unfolds. Great writing and imagination to say how it looked from the opposite side.
May 16, 2021
The abominable reality of the Old Testament, masterfully brought to life (... and death) in this short novel... too short actually... yet, what else can be said after Yahweh has spoken?
March 31, 2021
A relatively shocking read, with an excellent sense of building horror. Beautifully realized and does not go many of the easy ways one would think. The people of Jericho are so completely doomed and it is compellingly written. The ending feels that it should be a cop out but it feels alright in the context. The ending did drop it below the doomed greatness of Salammbo but it is its own book. I wish I could give it 4.93 stars.
July 30, 2010
This is Thomas Brookside's follow up to his incredibly creative and well executed "De Bello Lemures or The Roman War Against the Zombies of Armorica". Let's make one thing clear. Thomas Brookside may be self-published, but his writing is as crisp and descriptive as any big house publisher. Both stories take place in a very particular historical setting, and Brookside nails the narrator's tone and leaves readers with an extremely genuine exposition.
"Last Days of Jericho" tells the story of the fall of Jericho. Brookside's fictional account represents Joshua's god as a supernatural near-monster-like entity that destroys everything in its path.
The first-person narration is handled by a citizen in a fictional Jericho who manages the King's travel and trade. Brookside only teases his "monster" in the first half of the book, and the first hard-core supernatural activities don't occur until mid-way through the 130-page story. Bookending the horror, the reader is immersed in middle/late bronze age society, presented through day-to-day life, religion and cross-country diplomacy.
I'll hold back on the details so as not to divulge any key plot points, but as the second half of the book winds towards its conclusion, our narrator takes the reader through an almost metaphysical, and symbolically poetic journey. The author's afterword provides a nice perspective on his approach to writing the story.
This is a terrific book, and I can't wait to see Brookside score big. He's proven himself in his first two books, and I'll proudly state that I "read him when...".
I strongly recommend this book.
"Last Days of Jericho" tells the story of the fall of Jericho. Brookside's fictional account represents Joshua's god as a supernatural near-monster-like entity that destroys everything in its path.
The first-person narration is handled by a citizen in a fictional Jericho who manages the King's travel and trade. Brookside only teases his "monster" in the first half of the book, and the first hard-core supernatural activities don't occur until mid-way through the 130-page story. Bookending the horror, the reader is immersed in middle/late bronze age society, presented through day-to-day life, religion and cross-country diplomacy.
I'll hold back on the details so as not to divulge any key plot points, but as the second half of the book winds towards its conclusion, our narrator takes the reader through an almost metaphysical, and symbolically poetic journey. The author's afterword provides a nice perspective on his approach to writing the story.
This is a terrific book, and I can't wait to see Brookside score big. He's proven himself in his first two books, and I'll proudly state that I "read him when...".
I strongly recommend this book.
July 23, 2015
If not for getting the chance to read this book for free (yay Amazon lending library!) I might never have picked it up because it's self-published and well, I'm a snob. But I'm also really interested in fiction about the ancient world. It's rare to find a novel set during biblical times that doesn't have an agenda, and even more rare to find one that doesn't let its agenda get in the way of quality writing. Thomas Brookside manages to avoid both these traps and tell us another side of that story about the walls of Jericho, the story of a people being invaded and having to face an foe with terrifying and impossible to beat supernatural powers. That the god of Abraham was treated as supernatural at all is another unique thing about this book. When the narrator, a government official, witnesses the Israelite priests carrying their strange ark and describes the destructive pillars of light emerging from it and flattening entire army regiments I got chills. It was extremely well-plotted and was an intense, super-fast read. I couldn't put it down but was sad to see it end. This is one I'll probably revisit.
August 8, 2010
I have a longstanding fascination with the so-called history of the Old Testament. In fact, the first question that ever caused me to examine my religion of birth was how a God of Love could command his servants to directly commit genocide by their own swords, down to every last child and animal, when He (biblically-speaking) had the power to exterminate by supernatural means, thus psychologically sparing his followers?
This portrayal of the events in Joshua speaks to that speculation. The habiru are not passive participants in El's genocidal campaign, and Brookside doesn't shy away from portraying what extermination by the sword and the ax would really entail. (Thankfully, he doesn't indulge in gratuitous gruesomeness, simply the necessary depictions.) The confusion of the inhabitants and warriors of Yarich are well-drawn, but I appreciate the realism of these people not being completely innocent in their practices - the scene with the priest of Molech comes to mind as a good example of bronze-age barbarism and superstition.
All in all, an engrossing and fast-paced read.
This portrayal of the events in Joshua speaks to that speculation. The habiru are not passive participants in El's genocidal campaign, and Brookside doesn't shy away from portraying what extermination by the sword and the ax would really entail. (Thankfully, he doesn't indulge in gratuitous gruesomeness, simply the necessary depictions.) The confusion of the inhabitants and warriors of Yarich are well-drawn, but I appreciate the realism of these people not being completely innocent in their practices - the scene with the priest of Molech comes to mind as a good example of bronze-age barbarism and superstition.
All in all, an engrossing and fast-paced read.
February 1, 2015
To me, this book is a great example of what can be gained from independent authors and self-publishing. I purchased this book because it had one of the best concepts I've seen for a novel and it was executed very well.
I was expected it to come across as a horror more than it did, but that did not seem to subtract at all from my total enjoyment. The point of view of Sakal was a perfect and sane companion to the plot and all the characters - even when flawed - came across as very human and so elicited compassion from me.
Interestingly, the Jews became completely inhuman in comparison and their god completely alien and unknowable in its inexplicable violence.
It was this complete reversal of an old bible story that drew me in and I was definitely not disappointed. Thomas Brookside should be praised for his achievement in this novel.
I was expected it to come across as a horror more than it did, but that did not seem to subtract at all from my total enjoyment. The point of view of Sakal was a perfect and sane companion to the plot and all the characters - even when flawed - came across as very human and so elicited compassion from me.
Interestingly, the Jews became completely inhuman in comparison and their god completely alien and unknowable in its inexplicable violence.
It was this complete reversal of an old bible story that drew me in and I was definitely not disappointed. Thomas Brookside should be praised for his achievement in this novel.
January 21, 2012
The Last Days of Jericho is an excellent read. I enjoyed the story from the perspective of a resident of Yarich, it offered a fresh take on an old tale. The author did a good job developing the main character and developing the story at a pace that made it hard for me to put down. I would reccomend this book to anyone looking for a dark fantasy set an a historical period.
July 23, 2015
Just finished a reread. Still holds up. Still love it a lot.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews