Michael D. O'Brien

Michael O'Brien presents a thrilling apocalyptic novel about the condition of the Roman Catholic Church at the end of time. It explores the state of the modern world, and the strengths and weaknesses of the contemporary religious scene, by taking his central character, Father Elijah Schäfer, a Carmelite priest, on a secret mission for the Vatican which embroils him in a series of crises and subterfuges affecting the ultimate destiny of the Church.Father Elijah is a convert from Judaism, a survivor of the Holocaust, a man once powerful in Israel. For twenty years he has been "buried in the dark night of Carmel" on the mountain of the prophet Elijah. The Pope and the Cardinal Secretary of State call him out of obscurity and give him a task of the highest sensitivity: to penetrate into the inner circles of a man whom they believe may be the Antichrist. Their purpose: to call the Man of Sin to repentance, and thus to postpone the great tribulation long enough to preach the Gospel to the whole world.In this richly textured tale, Father Elijah crosses Europe and the Middle East, moves through the echelons of world power, meets saints and sinners, presidents, judges, mystics, embattled Catholic journalists, faithful priests and a conspiracy of traitors within the very House of God. This is an apocalypse in the old literary sense, but one that was written in the light of Christian revelation.

Island of the World is the story of a child born in 1933 into the turbulent world of the Balkans and tracing his life into the third millennium. The central character is Josip Lasta, the son of an impoverished school teacher in a remote village high in the mountains of the Bosnian interior. As the novel begins, World War II is underway and the entire region of Yugoslavia is torn by conflicting German and Italian occupying armies, and the rebel forces that resist them?the fascist Ustashe, Serb nationalist Chetniks, and Communist Partisans. As events gather momentum, hell breaks loose, and the young and the innocent are caught in the path of great evils. Their only remaining strength is their religious faith and their families. For more than a century, the confused and highly inflammatory history of former Yugoslavia has been the subject of numerous books, many of them rife with revisionist history and propaganda. The peoples of the Balkans live on the border of three the Islamic, the orthodox Slavic East, and Catholic Europe, and as such they stand in the path of major world conflicts that are not only geo-political but fundamentally spiritual. This novel cuts to the core how does a person retain his identity, indeed his humanity, in absolutely dehumanizing situations? In the life of the central character, the author demonstrates that this will demand suffering and sacrifice, heroism and even holiness. When he is twelve years old, his entire world is destroyed, and so begins a lifelong Odyssey to find again the faith which the blows of evil have shattered. The plot takes the reader through Josip's youth, his young manhood, life under the Communist regime, hope and loss and unexpected blessings, the growth of his creative powers as a poet, and the ultimate test of his life. Ultimately this novel is about the crucifixion of a soul?and resurrection.

Canadian bookseller Alex Graham is a middle-age widower whose quiet life is turned upside down when his college-age son disappears from school in England. Leaving his safe and orderly world for the first time in his life, Graham travels to Oxford, Russia and beyond in search of his lost son who might have become involved with a high-brow, New Age group. The father's odyssey leads him to fascinating and sometimes frightening people, places and perils - including imprisonment and torture for being mistaken as a spy.Through the uncertainty and the anguish, the loss and the longing, Graham considers his past - youth, marriage, and fatherhood. Apart from childhood illness and the loss of his beloved wife, the bookseller's life had gone rather smoothly within the confines of his small hometown, or so he had once believed.Pulled ever deeper into conflicts between nations, as well as the eternal conflict between good and evil, Graham is stretched nearly to the breaking point by the inexplicable suffering he witnesses and experiences. Struggling to overcome fear and discouragement, he discovers unexpected sources of strength as he presses onward in the hope of recovering his son--and himself.

An epic novel set in the rugged interior of British Columbia, the first volume of a trilogy which traces the lives of four generations of a family of exiles. Beginning in 1900, and concluding with the climactic events leading up to the Millennium, the series follows Anne and Stephen Delaney and their descendants as they live through the tumultuous events of this century. Anne is a highly educated Englishwoman who arrives in British Columbia at the end of the First World War. Raised in a family of spiritualists and Fabian socialists, she has fled civilization in search of adventure. She meets and eventually marries a trapper-homesteader, an Irish immigrant who is fleeing the "troubles" in his own violent past. This is a story about the gradual movement of souls from despair and unbelief to faith, hope, and love, about the psychology of perception, and about the ultimate questions of life, death and the mystery of being. Interwoven with scenes from Ireland, England, Poland, Russia, and Belgium during the War, Strangers and Sojourners is a tale of the extraordinary hidden within the ordinary. It is about courage and fear, and the triumph of the human spirit.

Elijah in Jerusalem, the long-awaited sequel to the acclaimed, best-selling novel Father Elijah: An Apocalypse, is the continuing story of the Catholic priest called to confront a powerful politician who could be the Antichrist foretold in the Bible.A convert from Judaism, a survivor of the Holocaust, and a participant in the founding of Israel, Father Elijah was for decades a monk on Mount Carmel, the mountain made famous by his Old Testament prophet-namesake. In the events of the preceding novel, the Pope commissioned Father Elijah to meet the President of the European Union, a man rising toward global control as President of the soon- to-be realized World Government. Recognizing in the President a resemblance to the anticipated Antichrist, the Pope asked Father Elijah to call the President to repentance, a mission that ended in failure.In this sequel, now-Bishop Elijah, wanted for a murder he did not commit, tries again to meet the President. Accompanied by his fellow monk Brother Enoch, he enters Jerusalem just as the President arrives in the holy city to inaugurate a new stage of his rise to world power. This time Elijah hopes to unmask him as a spiritual danger to mankind. As the story unfolds, people of various backgrounds meet the fugitive priest, and in the encounter their souls are revealed and tested.Elijah perseveres in his mission even when all seems lost. The dramatic climax is surprising, yet it underlines that God works all things to the good for those who love him.

Sophia House is set in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. Pawel Tarnowski, a bookseller, gives refuge to David SchAfer, a Jewish youth who has escaped from the ghetto, and hides him in the attic of the book shop. Throughout the winter of 1942-43, haunted by the looming threat of discovery, they discuss good and evil, sin and redemption, literature and philosophy, and their respective religious views of reality. Decades later, David becomes a convert to Catholicism, is the Carmelite priest Fr. Elijah SchAfer called by the Pope to confront the Anti-christ in Michael O'Brien's best-selling novel, Father Elijah: an Apocalypse.In this "prequel," the author explores the meaning of love, religious identity, and sacrifice viewed from two distinct perspectives. The cast of characters also includes the notorious Count Smokrev, a literate Nazi Major, a French novelist, a terrifying Polish bear, the Russian icon painter Andrei Rublev, and Pawel's beloved Kahlia, the elusive figure who moves through the story as an unseen presence. As the story unfolds, the loss of spiritual fatherhood in late Western society is revealed as a problem of language in the heart and soul, and as one of the gravest crises of our times. As the author points the way to rediscovery of our Father in heaven, he also shows us the path to renewal of human fatherhood. This is a novel about small choices that shift the balance of the world.

In this fast-paced, reflective novel, (the third in a trilogy following Strangers and Sojourners and Plague Journal) Michael O'Brien presents the dramatic tale of a family that finds itself in the path of a totalitarian government. Set in the near future, the story describes the rise of a police state in North America in which every level of society is infected with propaganda, confusion and disinformation. Few people are equipped to recognize what is happening because the culture of the Western world has been deformed by a widespread undermining of moral absolutes. Against this background, the Delaney family of Swiftcreek, British Columbia, is struck a severe blow when the father of the family, the editor of a small newspaper which dares to speak the truth, is arrested by the dreaded Office of Internal Security. His older children flee into the forest of the northern interior, accompanied by their great-grandfather and an elderly priest, Father Andrei. Their little brother Arrow also becomes a fugitive as the government seeks to remove any witnesses, and eradicate all evidence of its ultimate goals. As O'Brien draws together the several strands of the story into a frightening yet moving climax, he explores the heart of growing darkness in North America, examining events which have already occurred. The reader will take away from this disturbing book a number of urgent questions: Are we living in the decisive moment of history? How dire is our situation? Do we live in pessimistic dread, or a Christian realism founded on hope? This is a tale about the victory of the weak over the powerful, courage over terror, good over evil, and, above all, the triumph of love.

Plague Journal is Michael O'Brien's second novel in the Children of the Last Days series. The central character is Nathaniel Delaney, the editor of a small-town newspaper, who is about to face the greatest crisis of his life. As the novel begins, ominous events are taking place throughout North America, but little of it surfaces before the public eye. Set in the not-too-distant future, the story describes a nation that is quietly shifting from a democratic form of government to a form of totalitarianism. Delaney is one of the few voices left in the media who is willing to speak the whole truth about what is happening, and as a result the full force of the government is brought against him.Thus, seeking to protect his children and to salvage what remains of his life, he makes a choice that will alter the future of each member of his family and many other people. As the story progresses he keeps a journal of observations, recording the day-by-day escalation of events, and analyzing the motives of his political opponents with sometimes scathing frankness. More importantly, he begins to keep a "mental record" that develops into a painful process of self-examination. As his world falls apart, he is compelled to see in greater depth the significance of his own assumptions and compromises, his successes and failures. Plague Journal chronicles the struggle of a thoroughly modern man put to the ultimate spiritual and psychological test, a man who in losing himself finds himself.

Set eighty years in the future, this novel by the best-selling author Michael O'Brien is about an expedition sent from the planet Earth to Alpha Centauri, the star closest to our solar system. The Kosmos, a great ship that the central character Neil de Hoyos describes as a "flying city," is immense in size and capable of more than half light-speed. Hoyos is a Nobel Prize winning physicist who has played a major role in designing the ship. Hoyos has signed on as a passenger because he desires to escape the seemingly benign totalitarian government that controls everything on his home planet. He is a skeptical and quirky misanthropic humanist with old tragedies, loves, and hatreds that are secreted in his memory. The surprises that await him on the voyage--and its destination--will shatter all of his assumptions and point him to a true new horizon.Science fiction and fantasy literature are genres that have become dominant forces in contemporary worldwide culture. Our fascination with the near-angelic powers of new technology, its benefits and dangers, its potential for obsession and catastrophe, raises vital questions that this work explores about human nature and the cosmos, about man's image of himself and where he is going--and why he seeks to go there.

Ethan McQuarry is a young lighthouse keeper on a tiny island, the rugged outcropping of easternmost Cape Breton Island on the Atlantic Ocean. A man without any family, he sees himself as a silent vigilant, performing his duties courageously year after year, with an admirable sense of responsibility. He cherishes his solitude and is grateful that his interactions with human beings are rare. Even so, he is haunted by his aloneness in the world and by a feeling that his life is meaningless. His courage, his integrity, his love of the sea and wildlife, of practical skills and of learning are, in the end, not enough. He is faced with internal storms and sometimes literal storms of terrifying power. From time to time he becomes aware that messengers are sent to him from what he calls the awakeness in existence, the listeningness. But he cannot at first recognize them as messengers nor understand what they might be telling him, until he finds himself caught up in catastrophic events, and begins to see the mysterious undercurrents of reality--and the hidden face of love. They that go down to the sea in ships, trading upon the waters, they see the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep.- Psalm 107: 23

St. Luke addressed his Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles to a man named Theophilos.Who was Theophilos? Scripture scholars do not know, making him a fit subject for Michael O'Brien's vivid imagination. In this fictional narrative, Theophilos is the skeptical but beloved adoptive father of St. Luke. Challenged by the startling account of the "Christos" received in the chronicle from his beloved son Luke and concerned for the newly zealous young man's fate, Theophilos, a Greek physician and an agnostic, embarks on a search for Luke to bring him home. He is gravely concerned about the deadly illusions Luke has succumbed to regarding the incredible stories surrounding Jesus of Nazareth, a man of contradictions who has caused so much controversy throughout the Roman Empire.Thus begins a long journey that will take Theophilos deep into the war between nations and empires, truth and myth, good and evil, and into unexpected dimensions of his very self. His quest takes the reader into four ancient civilizations - the Greek, Roman, Jewish, and that of Christianity at its birth, where he meets those who knew this man that some believe is the Messiah.Though Theophilos is a man of the past ages, he is as familiar to us as the men of our own times. Schooled in the empiricism of both medicine and philosophy, Theophilos is well suited to speak to our age in which seeing cannot be the basis for faith, but rather hearing the witness of those who have been touched by God and opening ourselves to the possibility of an encounter with the living Christ. This is a story about the mysterious interaction of faith and reason, the psychology of perception, and the power of love over death.

The Harry Potter series of books and movies are wildly popular. Many Christians see the books as largely if not entirely harmless. Others regard them as dangerous and misleading. In his book A Landscape with Dragons, Harry Potter critic Michael O'Brien examines contemporary children's literature and finds it spiritually and morally wanting. His analysis, written before the rise of the popular Potter books and films, anticipates many of the problems Harry Potter critics point to. A Landscape with Dragons is a controversial, yet thoughtful study of what millions of young people are reading and the possible impact such reading may have on them. In this study of the pagan invasion of children's culture, O'Brien, the father of six, describes his own coming to terms with the effect it has had on his family and on most families in Western society. His analysis of the degeneration of books, films, and videos for the young is incisive and detailed. Yet his approach is not simply critical, for he suggests a number of remedies, including several tools of discernment for parents and teachers in assessing the moral content and spiritual impact of this insidious revolution. In doing so, he points the way to rediscovery of time-tested sources, and to new developments in Christian culture. If you have ever wondered why a certain children's book or film made you feel uneasy, but you couldn't figure out why, this book is just what you need. This completely revised, much expanded second edition also includes a very substantial recommended reading list of over 1,000 books for kindergarten through highschool.

Set in present day Manhattan, The Fool of New York City is the tale of two souls who are considered to be -fools- and -idiots- in the eyes of most people they encounter.One is a literal giant, the other an amnesiac who believes he is the 17th century Spanish painter Francisco de Goya, hundreds of years old, aging more slowly than the rest of the human race. Billy the giant has also briefly suffered from amnesia years ago, and he understands the anguish of those who have lost their identity. He is an apparently simple person, a failed basketball player with an enormous good heart who takes Francisco under his wing after they meet through a seeming coincidence. Together they undertake a laborious search to discover Francisco's true past.The trail leads them to numerous adventures, into the shrouded realm of hidden memories, the ironies and complexities of human character and destiny, of catastrophic evil and of redemption. It is a journey into the mysterious dimensions of the mind. It is about trauma and remembrance in America.

In this long-awaited fifth novel in his series, Children of the Last Days, Michael O'Brien explores the true meaning of poverty of spirit. Loosely based on the real lives of a number of native North Americans, A Cry of Stone is the fictional account of the life of a native artist, Rose Wâbos. Abandoned as an infant, Rose is raised by her grandmother, Oldmary Wâbos, in the remotest regions of the northern Ontario wilderness. The story covers a period from 1940 to 1973, chronicling Rose's growth to womanhood, her discovery of art, her moving out into the world of cities and sophisticated cultural circles. Above all it is the story of a soul who is granted little of human strengths and resources, yet who strives to love in all circumstances. As she searches for the ultimate meaning of her life, she changes the lives of many people whom she meets along the way. O'Brien takes the reader deep into the heart of a ''small'' person. There he uncovers the beauty and struggles of a soul who wants only to create, to help others to see what she sees. The story also explores the complex lies and false images, the ambitions and posturing that dominate much of contemporary culture, and shows how these have contributed to a loss of our understanding of the sacredness of each human life. Once again, Michael O'Brien beautifully demonstrates that no matter how insignificant a person may be in the world's eyes, marvels and mysteries are to be found in everyone. His central character, Rose, is among the despised and rejected of the earth, yet her life bears witness to the greatness in man, and to his eternal destiny.

By the Rivers of Babylon presents the early life of the prophet Ezekiel, from his childhood to his service in the Temple to the Babylonian Captivity, where he was enslaved among the exiles along the River Chebar.Ezekiel, a bricklayer, is simple and timid. He is not yet a priest, and his visions have not yet begun. He stands in the midst of the Jewish exiles as they struggle to build a town of their own, to remain faithful to God's covenant without the Temple, and to discern the various forces that threaten to divide them and erode their faith. All of these experiences flow like streams into Ezekiel's later mission to rally his people from inner destruction.What makes a prophet? Why was this man chosen? Michael O'Brien offers an intimate glimpse into the mind and heart of a visionary.

Dr. Owen Whitfield is the elderly Oxford professor of history who first appeared in Michael O''Brien''s novel The Father''s Tale . In the events of The Sabbatical, which occur sometime later, Dr. Whitfield is looking forward to a sabbatical year of peace and quiet, gardening in his backyard, and tinkering with what he calls his latest "unpublishable book". As the year begins, he is drawn by a series of seeming coincidences into involvement with a group of characters from across Europe, including a family that has been the target of assassination attempts by unknown powers. During his journey to Romania, the situation in which he finds himself becomes more sinister than it first seemed. The story deals with the tension between fatalism and the providential understanding of history, with the courage and love that are necessary for navigating through a confusion of signs, and with the triumph of faith and reason over the forces of destruction.

Best-selling novelist Michael O’Brien returns to the theme of people of faith striving to find their way through a societal collapse during the rise of new dimensions of totalitarianism.Set in the near future, all of North America is plunged into crisis as basic communications and other services suddenly and inexplicably fail. As the tension mounts, a disparate group of people come together from several directions, apparently by coincidence. Many of them are strangers to each other, and some are very young—whom their parents and guardians call “our pied piper children.”Moved by grace and dreams, they leave behind all securities and endure numerous alarming trials as they follow the thread of inspiration, seeking refuge in the mountains of British Columbia. Their choice to proceed in blind faith will bring about unforeseen consequences that are fully revealed only in the distant future.

The Harry Potter Series, book by book. Parental Strategies for Healthy Family Culture. Pope Benedict and Harry Potter. The War of Disinformation and Opinion. Harry Potter and the Gnostic Mind. Where Is It All Going? Twilight of the West. The Golden Compass or the Moral Compass? Master story-teller and artist Michael O’Brien—the man to whom CNN went for comment on Harry Potter—has penned the definitive work assessing the Potter phenomenon. This book is essential reading for all parents whose children have read or are considering reading the wildly popular offerings by J.K.Rowling and similar works such as Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series. Although this is an analytical work, the reader will be captivated from the beginning, from the must-read preface onward. O’Brien's earlier work, A Landscape with Dragons, delineated authentic Christian fantasy literature from its counterfeits. Now in Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture, he fascinatingly contrasts Potter-world with C.S. Lewis’s Narnia and with Tolkein’s The Lord of the Rings, and specifically Harry with Frodo. For those whose children have consumed Potter, O’Brien’s analysis will enable parents to comprehend the messages which have been fed their children and give them the points and arguments which will hopefully be the antidote to properly reset their moral order. The book goes beyond Potter, however, to address other bestselling series such as Twilight by Stephenie Meyer and Phillip Pullman’s The Golden Compass. In addition to these and other fantasy books, O’Brien reviews the films which they spawned. In all, the author’s new book teaches Christians how to discern harmless fantasy literature and film from that which is destructive to heart, mind and soul. I cannot recommend this work highly enough. John-Henry Westen Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief LifeSiteNews.com See F&T Press for more info www.ftbookstore.com

Of all the dimensions of the Faith, eschatology is probably the one that is the most neglected today—and one most believers are most suspicious of. Typically, books on the subject are either written by fundamentalist fear-mongers whose eschatology seems to come from the National Enquirer, or by their enemies, who soothe “peace, peace” when there is no peace, or by scholars who squint at gnats and swallow camels. Like Christ, this book will offend both Pharisees and Sadducees, both Herodian collaborators and Zealot revolutionaries. The book is a wake-up call. It is utterly relevant to our times. A plethora of views that echo the words of Christ, of scripture, of the Fathers, and of modern writers such as Lewis, Chesterton, Tolkien, Ratzinger, John Paul II, Mother Teresa, Christopher Dawson, Josef Pieper, Cardinal Newman, and the Catechism. These are united in a harmonious chorus to tell us that we sit at the edge of an abyss which we have ignored or masked. We sit in the Titanic’s deck chairs enjoying martinis. When Catholics hear and heed the message of this book, and not before, she will recover the passion and energy of our ancestors who, when they looked into the future, saw both a great light and a great darkness, both glory and gore, both wonder and war, where we see only a vague fog. —Dr. Peter Kreeft, author of C. S. Lewis for the Third Millennium and Christianity for Modern Pagans The comfort zone of Christians in once Christian societies is disappearing rapidly and a new totalitarianism, as the world has never seen before, is on the rise, preparing the way for a secular messiah—the Antichrist. Michael O’Brien is a whistleblower for sleeping Christianity, the whistle being the Word of God. We have acquired a habit of dumbing ourselves to the very severe warnings of our Lord Jesus Christ himself. But “we are people who can look into the reality of a dark age and find there the approaching victory of Christ.” Michael O’Brien’s book is a powerful call to prepare ourselves by making use of the many avenues of grace “that heaven is pouring out for us at this time.” —Gabriele Kuby, author of The Global Sexual Destruction of Freedom in the Name of Freedom The crisis we are facing today in the Church, in the family and in society in general is at an unprecedented level. Throughout history God has raised up prophets to warn about the severity of offenses to Almighty God. Michael O’Brien has for most of his life been such a voice in the wilderness. His clarion call about the Apocalypse we now face is an essential warning for all those with ears to hear. —John-Henry Westen, founder and publisher, Lifesite News Born in Ottawa in 1948, Michael O’Brien is the author of twenty-eight books, notably the novel Father Elijah and eleven other novels, which have been published in fourteen languages and widely reviewed in both secular and religious media in North America and Europe. His essays on faith and culture have appeared in international journals such as Communio, Catholic World Report, Catholic Dossier, Inside the Vatican, The Chesterton Review and others. For seven years he was the editor of the Catholic family magazine, Nazareth Journal. Since 1970 he has also worked as a professional artist and has had more than 40 exhibits across North America. Since 1976 he has painted religious imagery exclusively, a field that ranges from liturgical commissions to visual reflections on the meaning of the human person. His paintings hang in churches, monasteries, universities, community collections and private collections throughout the world. Michael O’Brien lives near Combermere, Ontario. He and his wife Sheila have six children and eleven grandchildren.

Svaki otac znade kako u životu obitelji postoje razdoblja kada se nevolje gomilaju, a duh klone.Otac mora umrijeti, ako želi dati život svojoj supruzi i djeci.Jesam li spreman naučiti više o sebi preko ozbiljnih kušnji? Hoću li dopustiti Ocu neka mi pomogne sazrijeti?"Krv nije voda!" veli poslovica, ali vjernici bi trebali povjerovati: "Niti Predragocjena Krv Kristova nije voda!"Borba protiv straha možda će potrajati čitav život, ali ne smijemo se brinuti tjeskobno. Gdje se - osim u zastrašujućim situacijama - možemo naučiti hrabrosti?

The human community is never more endangered than when totalitarianism appears to be benevolent. The new totalitarian’s idealism, his “humanitarianism,” his public image, may all communicate to us many good things, and thus our imagination is captured to the detriment of real discernment. We soon find ourselves succumbing to a magnetic attraction, and voting for leaders whose agendas mix admirable elements and fatal flaws. We then discover that we have elevated to positions of maximum influence men who would sacrifice human lives for the sake of “peace” or a thriving economy or some other value. Our guilt is denied, our sense of personal responsibility is numbed, to the degree that we perceive the sacrificed lives as statistical abstractions and our personal comforts as more real. By such choices we are revealed to ourselves. Where our treasure is, there is our heart. By and large, in the once-Christian democracies of the West we have been measured in the scales and found wanting.Author Born in Ottawa in 1948, Michael O’Brien is the author of twenty-eight books, notably the novel Father Elijah and eleven other novels, which have been published in fourteen languages and widely reviewed in both secular and religious media in North America and Europe.His essays on faith and culture have appeared in international journals such as Communio, Catholic World Report, Catholic Dossier, Inside the Vatican, The Chesterton Review and others. For seven years he was the editor of the Catholic family magazine Nazareth Journal.He has given hundreds of public talks and lectures at universities and churches throughout Europe and North America, and has frequently appeared as a guest on television programs in several nations. Since 1970 he has also worked as a professional artist and has had more than 40 exhibits across North America. Since 1976 he has painted religious imagery exclusively, a field that ranges from liturgical commissions to visual reflections on the meaning of the human person. His paintings hang in churches, monasteries, universities, community collections and private collections throughout the world.O’Brien lives near Combermere, Ontario. He and his wife Sheila have six children and ten grandchildren.

In this book, Michael O'Brien presents many of his stunning works of art. His vibrancy, originality, and variety are on display in more than 120 full-page, full-color reproductions of his paintings and Byzantine-style icons. Also included are some of his drawings and other works in black and white. O'Brien's pieces are introduced by Dr. Clemens Cavallin of the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, who analyses the artist's influences, principles, and unique style. In O'Brien's preface, he explains his development as a visual artist and his philosophy of sacred art.

Nathaniel Delaney dirige un modesto periódico local muy incómodo para el poder establecido. Sus páginas denuncian, incansables, la deriva del país hacia el totalitarismo, al imponerse a todos los niveles una ideología de apariencia benéfica y despiadada aplicación, incluso en la escuela. Cuando el gobierno decida eliminar ese foco de disidencia, la vida de Nathaniel y los suyos experimentará una tensión brutal e imprevista, que pondrá a prueba la solidez de los lazos familiares, de la amistad y del amor. Será el momento de tomar decisiones difíciles, tal vez dramáticas. Tras el éxito de El Padre Elías y El librero de Varsovia, Michael O’Brien ofrece a sus lectores otro thriller trepidante. Su pluma nos sitúa ante realidades acuciantes de nuestros días, obligándonos a reflexionar sobre el riesgo y la responsabilidad que implica asumir el propio destino.

The Donkey Dialogues is an exchange of letters which offers an intimate look, through the medium of an intense friendship, into the interior lives of two great Catholic writers, husbands and fathers.The friendship between O'Brien and Krajina deepens as the exchange progresses, revealing to the reader men who are masters of spiritual friendship. These letters, rich in a lived theology, radiate a warmth which is a manifestation of the one Body of Christ.

In "Arriving Where We Started" Michael O'Brien turns the clear light of faith on the decay of modern culture and on the origins of the decay in the spiritual bankruptcy of the West.Drawing on his experience as a novelist and a painter, O'Brien describes the rise and decline of the arts in parallel with the ages of faith and apostasy in Christendom. He remains fully alive to the extraordinary regenerative power of the faith and to the possibility of recovering the "sense of wonder at and consciousness of the splendour of existence".Michael O'Brien has examined the disintegration of the social fabric in 'Remembrance of the Future' and the crisis of the family in 'Father at Night'. 'Arriving Where We Started' completes a trilogy which sounds the tocsin for the Christian Civilization of the Western World. Taken from Justin Press

Dans un monastère sur le mont Carmel, un moine est convoqué par son supérieur. Il lui annonce que le pape souhaite lui confier une mission. Une histoire qui le ramène à sa vie d’avant. Avant qu’il ne rentre dans les ordres.C’est le début d’une aventure qui le confronte aux œuvres ténébreuses se dissimulant sous des masques d’honorabilité.Quelles sont ces forces qui tournent autour du Vatican, derrière quelles institutions se dissimulent elles, qui en sont les acteurs, que veulent-ils, peuvent-ils renoncer à leurs projets.Les morts s’accumulent, il faut choisir son camp.Très vite l’angoisse monte dans cette histoire hautement crédible qui semble se passer aujourd’hui. Un récit précis au cœur du Vatican. Des personnages à la psychologie détaillée confrontés à des combats spirituels et à des choix cornéliens.L’avenir même de l’Eglise est en jeu, le surnaturel et la foi dans la providence seront les meilleures armes de père Elijah.Michael O'Brien cumule les talents. Auteur à succès aux USA, traduit dans de nombreux pays, il est également artiste-peintre et collabore à de nombreux journaux.