The Watches of the Night
manuscript finished • 102,000 words
2001: Though the year is already fading in memory, it stands as a distant mirror of our own perilous times. Numerous authors and playwrights have addressed the wrenching aftermath of the attacks of 9-11, yet few, if any, have examined the months before. The world was hurtling towards a crossroads that would change it forever, and in my new novel, The Watches of the Night, one man’s journey is shadowed by that history about to happen.
It’s the story of Benjamin Hawken, a war hero and celebrated architect whose career and reputation were destroyed when the Monterey County Planetarium collapsed during its gala opening ceremonies, killing 91. Years later, in January, 2001, Ben is forced out of self-imposed exile to search for his vanished son—a physicist who has embarked on a crusade to prove that a terrorist conspiracy and structural sabotage were responsible for the planetarium catastrophe. Ben’s quest takes him to a Benedictine abbey in California, a meteor crater in Arizona, and a desperate shoot-out in a storm-torn village on the West coast of Mexico; from an Israeli Air Force base to a pitched sea battle at an obscure Mediterranean island and a high-stakes sting in Rome that unmasks traitors in the Vatican. Influenced by pivotal female characters, including his estranged daughter and a Muslim sniper, Ben’s path intersects with Arafat’s Second Intifada, the soon-to-explode scandals in the Catholic Church, and the prelude to 9-11, reaching its climax amidst the tragedy of that day.
Benjamin Hawken’s labyrinthine search for his son is a gripping trial by fire, enveloping him in unspeakable loss yet ultimately leading him through it—to reconciliations he never could have imagined and the one thing he never believed possible: the redemption of his own life.