Once Only

Seven Archangels #3.5

by Jane Lebak

When a Roman infant is abandoned to die on the roadside, five angels team up to save his life.

Ancient Romans used to leave their unwanted babies on the side of the road so someone else could pick them up. Sometimes slavers took the exposed babies, but a lot of times they died.

Not this baby. This baby got snatched up by his guardian angel and brought to Heaven. The problem? The angel shouldn’t have done that, and now Gabriel needs to put the baby back.

What starts as a simple drop-off turns into a complex assignment with five angels working on human hearts and human sympathies to find the infant a home. But none of them are sure there’s a way to mitigate the punishment due to the guardian angel who took the baby in the first place.

"Once Only" is a novelette in the Seven Archangels saga, featuring a few familiar faces, one new one, and the introduction of the Special Ops team.

50 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 13, 2017

About the author

Jane Lebak writes about angels, smart women, and angels who have to put up with smart women. Her stories are a random assortment of genres, both fiction and nonfiction, long form and short form. Some of it is pretty weird. One editor told her, "You think so far outside the box, I'm not sure you know there is a box."

Boxes are for cereal. Fiction wants to be free.

Jane lives in the Swamp and spends her time either writing books or ejecting stink bugs from the house. She is pretty sure no one reads these author bios.

Reviews

[Manuel Alfonseca · Rating 4 out of 5]

ENGLISH: A short story in the Seven Archangels series, just before The Wrong Enemy, although written later. To a certain point, it deals with a similar situation: a guardian angel who has behaved in an unexpected, perhaps unjustifiable way, possibly deserving punishment.

Although it deals with the exposition of newborn children in the Roman Empire, this story is actually a plea against the current widespread social acceptance of abortion.

ESPAÑOL: Novela corta de la serie de los Siete Arcángeles, colocada antes de The Wrong Enemy, aunque Lebak la escribió después. Hasta cierto punto, trata sobre una situación parecida: un ángel guardián que se ha comportado de un modo inesperado, quizás injustificable, posiblemente merecedor de un castigo.

Aunque trata sobre el abandono de niños recién nacidos en el Imperio Romano, esta historia es en realidad un alegato contra la aceptación social generalizada del aborto provocado en nuestros días.

[Karina Fabian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful

I love how Jane can take something as wonderful and all-living as angels doing the will of God and yet find ways of adding enough conflict to make an interesting story. Now I'm going to go wipe my eyes....

[Timothy Hendricks · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not like this book at all. It is billed as Christian Literature; but I didn't like it. It seems to mix Christian ideas with fantasy which isn't something that interests me. I came across it reading, "The Light Leads To Hope and Peace." Reading the synopsis of the book and looking at the cover I don't think I would have chosen it otherwise. People have enough problems believing without mixing it up with fantasy. I like Christian literature that uplifts; but I didn't feel that with this one.

[MarleneJS · Rating 5 out of 5]

angels don't sin....

But they can make errors. Short book you will love about an angel having mercy on a newborn where the culture of ancient Rome allows babies to be left out to die. aone or istands alone or in addition to her 7 archange!s serjes