The Prophecy

The Children of Lilith #3

by C. David Belt

For 6,000 years, Lilith and her Children have walked the earth, hunting, preying, seducing, corrupting, ruling from the shadows...until now.

An ancient prophecy, spoken by Adam, Lilith's grandfather, foretells her doom. She will do anything, corrupt any innocent, murder countless mortals to save herself.

To survive, she knows she must destroy Carl and Moira Morgan.

The war has begun.

And Carl and Moira know, win or lose, it all ends here.

320 pages, Paperback

First published April 22, 2013

About the author

C. David Belt was born in the wilds of Evanston, WY. As a child, he lived and traveled extensively around the Far East. In Thailand, he once fed so many bananas to a monkey, the poor monkey swore off bananas for life. He served as an Latter-day Saint missionary in South Korea and southern California (Korean-speaking), and yes, he loves kimchi. He graduated from Brigham Young University with a BS in Computer Science and a minor in Aerospace Studies, but he managed to bypass all English or writing classes. He served as a B-52 pilot in the US Air Force and as an Air Weapons Controller in the Washington Air National Guard and was deployed to locations so secret, his family still does not know where he risked life and limb (other than in an 192' wingspan aircraft flying 200' off the ground in mountainous terrain). When he is not writing, he sings in the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square and works as a software engineer. He collects swords, spears, and axes (oh, my!), and other medieval weapons and armor. He and his wife have six children and live in Utah with an eclectus parrot named Mork (who likes to jump on the keyboard when David is writing). There is also a cat, but she can't be bothered to take notice of the parrot, and so that is all the mention we shall make of her.

Reviews

[Deborah]

Disclaimer: I was given a review copy by the publisher.

It had been awhile since I'd read The Penitent but there were enough references in The Prophecy to the main events in The Penitent to get me back in the story. The Prophecy picks up right where The Penitent left off so if you haven't read the previous book, you are going to be totally lost.

So now it's war. And war is ugly. And painful. And you lose people you care about. And it seems unfair. And hopeless. And because of the prophecy, Carl and Moira know that if they lose, they die and if they win, they die because all Lilith's children will die with her.

C. David Belt doesn't hold much back as he shows how evil Lilith is. I really like the part where Tony breaks the rules and is in contact with the enemy even though Carl tells his followers, “I cannot stress this enough, people: please watch what you say on cell phones, text messages, and emails. If you're posting on a blog or Facebook or some other website, please stop. Even little details can be assembled into a larger picture like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle."

But the rules don't apply to Tony, he's too smart. However, while we are free to chose our actions, we are not free to chose the consequences and sometimes it isn't us who ends up paying the price. And of course there are consequences to Tony's actions. It was hard reading about the consequences, but Belt managed to find the perfect balance of horror without going over the line with graphic details.

That said, there will be readers who will disagree with me and think Belt did cross the line and think it was too horrible for words. But that was the point, Lilith is capable of acts too horrible for words just like Satan. We all know people who think they are smarter than Satan and the rules don't apply to them; Belt is illustrating the consequences of this attitude in his story. Belt just takes the consequences to the worst extreme.

Belt adds two new groups of players in the war against Lilith -- the Marines and The People of Esther. Both play an integral part in the conclusion of the story. And while in one way the story ended the way I expected, I was surprised with how Belt handled The People of Esther and the future of life in this world without Lilith.

Overall, the three books were well written and it was a really good story with a satisfying ending.

[Tammy Hall]

Let's imagine that everything you have ever been taught to believe in any religion has just been altered and a new theory has been brought to attention making you question the realm of it's possibility then you add in a few thousand vampires and boom there it is sitting right in front of you making perfect sense right? Wrong! This is the mind blowing experience I had while reading The Prophecy. The genre horror,vampire is everything this story has and more! I found myself more than a couple of times wanting to cover my eyes as the scenes in the book played out before me in my mind. In The Prophecy Lilith will stop at nothing until she has what it is she wants and she doesn't care what she has to do to or who she has to kill to get it. This is a war between everything you thought was good and the mind blowing 6,000 year old evil and it's impending doom. New theories are introduced as to who Lilith really is and how she could still roam the earth after 6,000 years that may make you want to make you question your sanity and your mind wonders onto the probability of it's truth. Life for the characters in this book become one gigantic living nightmare that you as the reader get drawn into wishing at any moment you will wake up and realize it was just that a nightmare that never really happened...or did it? The war is upon us and who will become the victor or will all be wiped out by the horrific legion of vampires set out to destroy everything and anyone in their path. Can Carl and Moira stop Lilith before it's to late? I can't tell you however, I will tell you it definitely does end here. You will not be let down by The Prophecy if horror is what you seek. this is one story I wished I hadn't taken to bed with me to read.

[꧁Brutally Honest꧂]

I have a feeling that the author sees sexuality in women as bad. Women bad. Men good. Virginal good. Sex bad.