THE ILLUMINATION

Everyone is after an ancient jewel-encrusted amulet called the “Eye of Dawn.” The Guardians of the Khalifah believe it will ensure the global domination of Islam, and the ultra-fundamentalist Sons of Babylon believe it will usher in the Second Coming. When an American news correspondent discovers the amulet in the Iraqi sands, she sends it as a gift to her sister, a museum curator, and hours later is killed by assassins. Sandra Burr narrates the story with enunciation that is so precise that it comes across as unnatural. Burr often gives the sense that she’s reading a script rather than telling a story. The story, like the reading, is over-the-top and melodramatic, with two-dimensional characters that Burr renders even more implausible by reading them as caricatures. S.E.S. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine [Published: JULY 2009]