The Murder of Jesus Christ

Afterword (by the real author)

When I first thought about writing this novel, I wanted it to be a book that Christian believers and non-believers alike would love. That balance presented a challenge that grabbed me and ensured I was always on my toes.

I couldn’t have written The Murder of Jesus Christ without help, and I’d like to acknowledge some of the folks who helped me along the way.

In chapter 27, Erika Sabo pulls off her most incredible feat, making the moon disappear. In my first draft I included details of what I thought that would do to Earth, but I wasn’t positive I was right. I contacted Dr. Adiv Paradise at the University of Toronto. He in turn pulled in Professor Diana Valencia (also from the University of Toronto) and J.J. Zanazzi, a brilliant grad student at Cornell University who works on tidal effects on exoplanets.

They provided a detailed exploration of my question which was astonishing, thoughtful, and surprising. Not only did they show I was completely off base with my own assumptions, they brought up many, many details that could never have occurred to me. Some of their work found its way into the final version, and I am grateful to them all.

On the religion side of things, I also have two special people to thank.

Pastor Darrell Bierman (of River City Church in Cambridge, Ontario) and Pastor Roy Robbins (of Christ Lutheran Church in Chino, California) both listened intently to my original thoughts for the novel, and both strongly encouraged me to write it down. During the planning phase, I asked many, many questions of both, and both were kind enough to provide thoughtful answers to them. In addition, I’ve listened to Darrell give hundreds of sermons, all which collectively informed my views.

It’s odd to list a bibliography in works of fiction, but in this case I thought it might be useful for me to list some of the books I read as part of my research. You may or may not be interested in them, but either way, it’ll give you a sense of where some of my background information came from.

The Holy Bible, NLT (New Living Translation Version), Biblica Publications, 1996.

BibleGateway.com, a vital reference allowing you to instantly locate anything in the Bible.

The Bible for Dummies, Jeffrey Geoghegan and Michael Homan, John Wiley and Sons, 2003.

Asimov’s Guide to the Bible, Isaac Asimov, Doubleday, 1968. A massive two-volume analysis of historical and cultural aspects of the Bible.

The Dead Sea Scrolls, Life Books, 2017.

Finding Jesus, by David Gibson and Michael McKinley, St. Martins’ Press, 2015. A series of discussions on some of the artifacts found by archeologists from Jesus’s era.

Jesus and the Apostles, National Geographic Books, 2014.

Jesus and the Origins of Christianity, National Geographic Books, 2017.

Killing Jesus, by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard, St. Martin’s Press, 2013. This is a detailed account of Jesus’s life and death.

The Life of Jesus, Time Life Books, 2017.

The Real Jesus, National Geographic Magazine, December 2017.

The Shack, by Wm. Paul Young, Windblown Media, 2007. This is the only work of fiction on this list. This book helped show me how a novel could appeal to all readers.

The Story, Zondervan Publications. This is an easy-to-read summary of the main story of the Bible.

The Story: Getting to the Heart of God’s Story, Randy Frazee, Zondervan Publications. This is the participant’s guide to the main book. Frazee also has created a series of videos that help clarify the words of the Bible.

All the people and sources above are experts in their fields, but at the end of the day, I had to decide what found its way into the book. In some cases, I simplified concepts, and I totally ignored others that would have overcomplicated what I was aiming for. Any omissions or errors in the novel are my own, not the people advising me.

One other point I want to make. I didn’t intend to create a detailed alternative world that would exist without Jesus having preached 2,000 years ago. I took many, many shortcuts, assuming much of the world would remain the same. This is clearly not accurate, but I wasn’t aiming for that. I wanted to tell a good story, not describe a complete alternate history. I’ll leave that to another writer with different interests than me.

It’s no exaggeration to say I couldn’t have written this novel without the encouragement and feedback from my number one fan, my beautiful and thoughtful wife, Fatima Monteiro.

Thanks are due to my pre-readers who helped iron out errors: Lisa Rath, David Solow, Tod Clark, David M. Wilson, and Michael Bailey. I am very grateful.

It was fabulous to get the Bad Moon Books team together again. My sincere gratitude to Roy Robbins, Cesar Puch, and Jamie La Chance. And, I can’t miss thanking Tomislav Tikulin for the amazing cover!

And, finally, thank you to everybody who picked up this book and read it. Whatever your religious views might be, I hope you found something in the novel to enjoy.