The day after I finished the book I was greeted with the newspaper headline "Judas Gospel Discovered". In a surreal case of life imitating art imitating life, there on the television was a Vatican spokesman talking down the authenticity and veracity of the contents of the Judas Gospel. Adrian d'Hage's fictional work of The Omega Scroll takes on a much more plausible tone.

It's 2005 and the Vatican is under the control of a power hungry man, Cardinal Lorenzo Petroni, who is eying off the prospect of becoming Pope with the pontiff's health failing at an alarming rate. Petroni perceives one major threat to his rise to power, the discovery and decoding of the Dead Sea Scrolls and, in particular, the Omega Scroll.

The Omega Scroll (the ancient scroll, that is, as opposed to this book), is in 3 parts, each of them opposing the teachings of the Vatican. These 3 parts are summed up as the Magdalene Numbers, the origin of DNA and the promise of cataclysm. Any one of these parts of the scroll could possibly undermine the Vatican's by uncovering the lies that have been kept from Catholics for hundreds of years, not least of which is the true origin of life. As far as Cardinal Petroni is concerned, it is a secret that must be maintained no matter the cost.

This is a sprawling, ambitious novel that spans over 30 years and mainly tracks the lives of 4 people, each of whom are destined for great things, should they live long enough. These people will prove to become very influential internationally are integral to the development of the story and so we find that we are thrust forward and backward in time to witness how their lives brought them to the present and their rise to prominence.

The first is a young priest by the name of Fr Giovanni Donelli, a humble man who exudes peace and a quiet confidence. Then there is a young Italian scientist named Allegra Bassetti, a beautiful woman from a small village who left her home to become a nun. She along with Professor David Kaufmann bring the Omega Scroll to light and begin the arduous task of deciphering it. Finally, there is a young Palestinian by the name of Abdul Sartawi living through the hell of the Middle-Eastern war. As the story continues their lives follow widely different courses, yet they are destined to each play a major role in a resounding finale.

A particularly strong feature of The Omega Scroll is the attention to detail d'Hage has gone to in developing all of his character. He could have simply presented us with his villains and let them do their evil without explanation, but no, he supplies us with their early lives illustrating where their deeper motives have come from. Through this there is an easy understanding about why each event takes place and a certain inevitability about the drama as it unfolds. Equally with the books protagonists, their lives are tracked in rich detail as they rise from obscurity, giving us a familiarity which ensures that we take a real stake in their lives that we would otherwise not have had.

Christianity, Islam and Judaism, the Middle-East peace process, corruption in the Vatican and a dire warning predicting an approaching cataclysmic apocalypse, there's not much that isn't covered in this novel that sizzles from the first page.

Incredibly well researched, the scene shifts effortlessly from remote mountain villages in Italy to the war-torn Middle-East and back to the Vatican as d'Hage writes with descriptive flair that marries historical facts with his fiction in a seamless union. Tied in to all this is the race between uncovering the true meaning of the Omega Scroll and the attempts to make sure it never sees the light of day.

The Omega Scroll is over 500 pages long, yet it's a captivating page-turner providing thrilling action from the opening scene. This was one of the most satisfying epic adventures that I have read in a long time.