back

ENOCH'S PORTAL
by A.W. Hill
(Champion Press Ltd., 265 pp., hc, $25.00, 2002)

The dust jacket touts this as "A Stephan Raszer Investigation." I'll make only passing mention that, since this is the first outing for both Hill and his intended series character, the fact that it's a Stephan Raszer investigation probably doesn't mean much to you. What's important is that, should you ever see the phrase again, after reading this book, it's unlikely to mean much to you then, either.

Raszer is as unique a private investigator as has come along in some time. Perhaps taking a cue from Jay S. Russell's far more engaging Marty Burns, Raszer is a former actor, although highly specialized in his chosen casework. An obsessive spiritual seeker himself, he makes big bucks as a globe-trotting rescuer of hapless souls who have strayed off under the spells of dangerous New Age gurus . an unlikely combination of James Bond and Deepak Chopra, whose female assistant does a superb job of hanging around to keep the office and computers running, and providing the requisite unrequited sexual tension.

Raszer's nemesis is Luc Fourché, who first appears in a promising prologue as the willing victim of a ritual murder inside the Great Pyramid. Years later, however, he appears to be not only alive and kicking, but attracting devotees, as the (allegedly) charismatic leader of the Temple of the Sun, an international cult whose members have begun littering various cities with their group suicides - think Heaven's Gate, without the comet, drugged applesauce, and matching sneakers.

If you guessed that these two titans of men are destined to go mano-a-mano over a woman, give yourself a tin star. Raszer's rescuee is Sofia Gould, a never-was actress who, until meeting Luc, has been doing life in Bel Air as the trophy wife of a film studio CEO willing to put up millions to get her back.

Somewhere in this there's probably a good story. Enoch's Portal (the title refers to the Old Testament prophet's bodily ascension into Heaven) isn't it, in part collapsing under the weight of endless blather about the Knights Templar, Hermetic magic, Sufism, Jewish Kabbalism, John Dee and Enochian magic, Australian Dreamtime myths, quantum physics, and more. I'll be the first to admit that I generally find these topics fascinating, with the bookshelves to prove it. Here, it's all simply too much to only dulling effect. Actually, in last year's Domain, Steve Alten did a far better job of incorporating vast amounts of research into his novel, making it both interesting and integral to the story, without turning it into roadblocks. (I know - I can't believe I just said it either.)

But even twenty pounds of research in a five-pound bag can be excused as long as the author serves up characters with whom you can really get on board. Here, they're mostly annoying. It's tough to work up much sympathy for the idle rich whose emptiness and need for enlightenment leads them to charlatans. Who else is in danger along with Sofia? A model, a European bank president, a professional skier . are we really to fear for their immortal souls when it hasn't even been established that they have any?

Then there's Raszer himself, who's at his strongest when he's straining credibility. He has a knack for knowing or meeting a parade of stunning women eager to bed him at a moment's notice; which can happen, but if you've ever laughed at Austin Powers, it's hard to take this sort of thing seriously anymore, even as fantasy. Still, how about Raszer's adventures in Prague? In the span of mere hours he has part of an ear bitten away (no, it wasn't Mike Tyson), has arteries in his neck and arms sliced by a professional killer and nearly bleeds to death, climbs a castle wall with a bad ankle, fires and dodges bullets, hobnobs with Czech Republic president Vaclav Havel, and still isn't too tuckered out to bed another woman and father her child. Forget Nobel Prizes - give this man an MVP award!

And as long as I'm griping, it really bugs me when an author sidles up to an icon like Jimi Hendrix but doesn't realize his name's not spelled "Jimmie." Of lesser sacrilege, Erich von Daniken's name also gets a good mangling.

If things sound hopeless for A.W. Hill, they're not. First, on a strictly prose level, he writes quite well. Second, he seems to come up with secondary characters who are more compelling than the primaries. Give him points for having the verve to use a real-life head of state. And Juraj Dubrovsky, a hulking Czech bodyguard, is a gem in search of a better setting. That he works for an agency whose guards are so dedicated that they can often find themselves assigned to opposite sides of a conflict is fascinating ... but unfortunately, little comes of it here.

It's glimmers like this that lead me to suspect that Hill has an excellent book in him. But with this present direction, and more Raszer installments on the way, I fear he's barking up the wrong bodhi tree.