Peter Saul and Mary Limited

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Category:	Fiction
Author:	Chris Jones
Publisher:	Lulu
Price:	£9.97
ISBN:	978-1847539458
Pages:	204
Reviewed in issue:	7

This is a handsome book with a striking cover, nicely bound and printed on good paper. The first thing I noticed inside was the slightly odd layout – the font is small, and the text is double-spaced throughout – but I soon got used to it, and it didn’t interfere with my reading.

Peter Fisher (aka St Peter), Saul Tarsus and Mary Magdalene are top brass in a company of eternal soulbrokers, harvesting the souls of the dead to be refined into energy or recycled into new souls. This is big business, complete with power play, conflicts of interest and many, many board meetings. The book follows the company’s development over the two hundred years between the Black Death and the mid-sixteenth century, encompassing religious schism, a brush with organised crime and advances in real-world technology.

Chris Jones is a clever man. He’s blended elements of history, mythology, the Bible, popular song and office comedy to produce a book in which every page teems with witty references and teasingly familiar quotes. He’s also a good writer – the text is sharp, tight and fast-paced. Unfortunately, the book’s cleverness is also its downfall. The fact that characters frequently converse in popular song lyrics is amusing at first, but soon becomes irritating. Character development and plot are sacrificed to novelty and wit, and I longed for a bit of story that I could get my teeth into without these distractions. An interesting idea, but perhaps more suited to a short story than a novel.

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