New series will keep readers on the edge of their seats
Part 2 of an
interview with Terry Brennan,
Author of Ishmael
Covenant
What if three ancient empires
were poised to rise again and begin an epic battle for the land they once
occupied in the Middle East? What if this battle was the fulfillment of a
prophecy that would set into motion the end of the world as we know it? Those questions
were the launching point for award-winning author Terry Brennan as he began
writing his new series, Empires of
Armageddon. The series from Kregel Publications begins with Ishmael Covenant, a
fast-paced, modern-day international thriller.
Fans
of Joel C. Rosenberg, Steven James, and Ted Dekker will relish the deadly
whirlpool of international intrigue and end-times prophecy in Ishmael
Covenant and eagerly await the rest of this new trilogy.
Learn
more about Ishmael Covenant in this interview with Terry Brennan.
Q: Tell us a little bit about your new
Empires of Armageddon series, specifically the first book, Ishmael Covenant.
The
three-book Empires of Armageddon series is a fast-paced, modern-day
international thriller, constructed around historical fact and historical
fiction. The story
envelops the lives of nearly a dozen key characters but is driven by three
primary characters: Diplomatic Security Service Special Agent Brian Mullaney;
Joseph Atticus Cleveland, the newly appointed US ambassador to Israel; and
their unknown but evident enemy, the Turk, an immortal agent of evil who serves
the One.
Out of the
chaos and conflict of today’s Middle East, it appears that three ancient
empires (Persian, Islamic, and Ottoman) are about to resurrect themselves. One
belief of the Islamic faith is that once an Islamic nation rules any part of
the earth, it rules that part of the earth forever. So, ultimately, each of
those empires would covet, and attempt to control, the same slice of land that
each empire once ruled—from the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia, through the
rocky desert known as Palestine, to the Nile Delta in Egypt. The collision of those competing empires could
trigger the climactic events in the Valley of Megiddo.
The series explores how this
potential clash of empires might impact current history, future events, and the
viability of the Jewish state. One immediate impact of an emergent Persian
Empire (an alliance between the majority Shia governments of Iran and Iraq) is
to drive their ancient enemies, the Sunni Arabs of Saudi Arabia, into a treaty
and mutual defense pact with, of all people, Israel. Thus the Ishmael Covenant,
the joining together of the tribe of Abraham and the tribe of Ishmael.
The plot is kick-started when the first of two messianic
prophecies, written in 1794 by the legendary Jewish Talmudic scholar the Vilna
Gaon, is revealed in Jerusalem. Mullaney accepts the responsibility of guardian of the Gaon’s second
prophecy and the box that protects it, which puts his life, and the lives of
his loved ones, in terrible peril and direct opposition to the Turk. The Turk
and the One have been focused on a singular purpose for thousands of years: if
they can prevent the fulfillment of one messianic biblical prophecy, they can
eradicate the validity of all prophecy and change the end of the Book—the
outcome of the Battle of Armageddon. What is contained in the Gaon’s prophecy
could destroy their plans.
That theme
of ultimate evil trying to overthrow the plans of God fuels the story of Ishmael Covenant, which utilizes
this geopolitical cauldron and its biblical ramifications as the backdrop for
an epic testing of one man’s character when faced with multiple adversaries who
threaten his family, his faith, and his country. How Brian Mullaney responds to
his calling could dictate the fate of this world—and the onset of the next.
Q: How do aspects of actual history come
together with a fictional modern-day story in your book?
There are numerous threads of actual history woven
throughout the plot, threads that become critical catalysts in the unfolding of
Ishmael Covenant and the rest of the series.
The story of the Vilna Gaon—Rabbi Elijah ben Shlomo
Zalman (1720–1797)—that launches the narrative is accurate in all its
historical elements. He was the foremost Talmudic scholar of his age and a
renowned genius on both sacred and secular learning. The story of the Gaon’s
prophecy about Russia and Crimea, revealed by his great-great-grandson in 2014,
is true and led many to believe that the coming of the Jewish Messiah was near
at hand. The Gaon did attempt three trips to Jerusalem from his native
Lithuania; the last one, only a few years before his death, ended prematurely
in Konigsberg, Prussia. All of that history is extensively integrated into the
story arc that plays out over all three books. The story of the Gaon’s second prophecy is a product of my own
imagination.
The ancient biblical conflict between the nation of Israel
and the people of Amalek—the descendants of Abraham and Ishmael—is a
fundamental element in the conflict driving the series. Other historically
accurate elements of the book include the rise of ISIS in Syria and Iraq in
2014, the worldwide confiscation of Iranian financial assets following the
hostage crisis in 1979, NATO’s nuclear sharing project which still has sixty-one
nuclear bombs in bunkers at the Incirlik Airbase, the geopolitical weapon that
water has become in the Middle East, the history of the Hurva Synagogue in
Jerusalem, and the history of the Jews in Turkey. All were vital to the
development of this fictional series.
Q: What kind of research went into this
series? How much time have you spent in the locales where Ishmael Covenant takes
place?
I did an extensive amount of online
research on the history of the Vilna Gaon, his involvement with Jewish
mysticism (kabbalah), his continued influence on Jewish theology, and the role
his followers played in the building and history of the Hurva Synagogue in
Jerusalem. Much more contemporary research was required into the concept of
NATO’s policy of nuclear sharing as well as the structure of the US State
Department and the duties and layout of its operations center. Additionally, the mission
and makeup of the US military’s top-secret Joint Special Operations Command was
earnestly pursued and is factually portrayed, as was the structure and
assignment of the Diplomatic Security Service, one of America’s “armed
services” and the most widely represented law enforcement agency in the world.
Several years ago, my wife and I spent
three weeks in Israel, visiting almost all the locales in this and my previous
series, immersing ourselves in the history of the land and the culture of its
people. Engaging a Palestinian Christian as our guide provided us with some
unique access. Over the years, I’ve made many trips to Washington, DC,
including an exclusive trip to what was then called the Old Executive Office
Building inside the White House compound. By necessity, locales with high
security or limited access were researched online, often aided by visuals
through Google Maps.
Q: How did your career
in journalism prepare you to write this series?
Journalists are trained observers. They
absorb, analyze, and report on what they see. When I write, I see the
stories as movies. In other words, I’m writing what I see in my mind, which is
similar to what I did as a journalist, especially my ten years as a
sportswriter. I would watch an event and then replay it in my mind to
accurately recount it for my readers.
Perhaps the most tangible result of
being a journalist is that I approach my writing as a gardener, not as an
architect. Architects are the writers who have everything planned and
plotted out before they get started, including extensive biographies for all
their key characters and a detailed outline that is a road map for the entire
book. Journalists don’t have the time for such exhaustive planning. Journalists
are more like gardeners. You watch a game. You’re on deadline. You have an
idea. You start writing and see where it takes you. My characters generally
reveal themselves to me as I write. So, in writing novels, my process is normally
to see how the plot grows and matures and where my characters take the story.
But one of the first things I learned
as a writer is that novels are not written in the same way newspaper stories
are written. There is an age-old structure to the way fictional novels are
written, a structure that brings clarity to the story and comfort to readers.
So, I needed to be retrained for a new style of writing.
My nonprofit career, my second career, impacted the
series in a significant way. For twenty years I worked for agencies that
ministered to homeless people in New York City. While I was a journalist, I really
didn’t have a social justice bone in my body. After living in The Bowery
Mission for seven years, not only did my social justice perspective change by
seeing injustice, poverty, mental illness, and racism on a personal level, but
my heart changed as well.
Two of the primary characters in the series are black
men, one African American, one Caribbean. As a white man, they were challenging
characters for me to write because I wanted to get them right. I wanted to
accurately represent the reality of being a black man in America. I read a lot
and received solid counsel and guidance from those close to me who personally
experience a black man’s reality. I hope the characters and their worldviews
are portrayed honestly and accurately.
More on Brennan can be found at www.terrybrennanauthor.com. He is also on Facebook (Terry Brennan) and Twitter (@terrbrennan1).
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