by Alan Gold
My wife, Eva, and my son, Raffe, were instrumental in helping me edit this work, and to them go my deepest gratitude.
My most sincere appreciation and admiration go to the team at Simon & Schuster in Australia and the USA. Lou Johnson, managing director of Simon & Schuster in Australia, has an incisive understanding of how books today have had to change to meet the challenges of a digital world, and her brilliance puts her head and shoulders above the rest. Larissa Edwards, head of publishing, is the bedrock of its publication, the ideal colleague in such an enterprise, tough but always understanding; Roberta Ivers brought a wonderfully perceptive and critical eye to this manuscript and her advice and suggestions were invaluable, as were those of Jo Butler and Jo Jarrah. No book will be a success unless marketed and sold professionally, and there is no more professional group in the Australian book industry than the wonderful Anabel Pandiella, Greg Tilney, and Kate Cubitt and her remarkable team. In America, my thanks go to the president and publisher of the Atria imprint of Simon & Schuster, Judith Curr, and my editor, Daniel Loedel.
And to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob goes my reverence, because without them, where would I (or Western civilization) be? The world’s three great Abrahamic religions have an intimate, if strained, alliance in Israel. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—father, son, and grandson—live there in the closest proximity; yet, tragically, at times they could not be further apart. From this benighted land has sprung the most profound philosophies, literature, and poetry; yet for thousands of years its peoples have been torn apart by hatred, jealousy, and violence.
So will there ever be peace among these three faiths? God knows!
Alan Gold
A book is no easy thing to write. It’s a titanic wrestle of words and endurance. And it’s not an endeavor one can face on his own. To that end there are many to thank.
First and foremost, to my collaborator, Alan Gold, whose energy and enthusiasm know no bounds. Thank you for having me along for the ride. Thanks also to our producer, Harold Finger, who saw the vision and wanted to back it.
We could not have wished for a more engaged, insightful, or forward-thinking publisher than Simon & Schuster Australia. Endless thanks go to Lou Johnson, Larissa Edwards, Roberta Ivers, Anabel Pandiella, Greg Tilney, Kate Cubitt, and all the S&S team.
Of course, the greatest thanks of all go to my family for putting up with me, loving me, and catching me when I fall.
Mike Jones
© ALAN GOLD
ALAN GOLD is an internationally published and translated author of fifteen novels, his most recent being Bell of the Desert, published in 2012 in the USA.
He speaks regularly to national and international conferences on a range of subjects, most notably the recent growth of anti-Semitism. He was a delegate at the United Nations World Conference on Racism and Xenophobia held in Durban, South Africa, in 2001, and has addressed UN conferences and meetings throughout the world as well as universities and community groups.
Alan is a regular contributor to the Australian, the Spectator, and other media as an opinion columnist and literary critic, and a lecturer and mentor at the master’s and doctoral degree level in creative writing at the Universities of Sydney and Western Australia and the Australian National University.
© MIKE JONES
MIKE JONES is a writer and creative producer working across screen, page, and digital media. His work has received numerous accolades, including an Australian Writers Guild AWGIE Award. He has lectured internationally on interactive and multi-platform storytelling and is currently commissioned to write a three-volume series of gothic horror novels to be published in 2015.
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HeritageTrilogy.com.
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authors.simonandschuster.com/Mike-Jones
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the authors’ imaginations, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Alan Gold and Mike Jones
Originally published in 2013 by Simon & Schuster (Australia) Pty Limited.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information, address Atria Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.
First Atria Paperback edition September 2014
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Interior design by Leydiana Rodríguez-Ovalles
Cover design by James Perales
Cover photographs: Jerusalem old city, Israel © Jevgen Sosnytskyi/Shutterstock, Vintage aged old paper © Maxx-Studio/Shutterstock
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gold, Alan, 1945–
Bloodline : The Heritage Trilogy : Book One / Alan Gold and Mike Jones.—First Atria Books trade paperback edition.
pages cm.—(Heritage trilogy; Book one)
1. Politics and government—Fiction. 2. Jerusalem—Fiction. 3. Political fiction.
I. Title.
PR9619.3.G5764B56 2014
823’.914—dc23 2013047461
ISBN 978-1-4767-5984-5
ISBN 978-1-4767-5985-2 (ebook)