Book Review: Latter-Day Cipher by LaTayne C. Scott

Award winning author LaTayne C. Scott has another hit with the suspense thriller Latter-Day Cipher. Scott takes the reader through an incredible journey of Mormon history. For this reviewer, it was a bit of deja vu having lived in Utah and being part of the Mormon church and culture for many years.

Scott brings to the Latter-Day Cipher many historically documented facts such as the Masonic links, Blood Atonement, and a gentle inside look at the hot topic in the news of polygamy. Has the media played a role in how the public perceives church tradition? As a reader you have the opportunity to take a look inside to how it began, developed, and why some will not give it up--and not for the reasons most people think.

Kirsten Young, a well-known and rebellious Utah heiress is found murdered in Provo Canyon. The strange markings carved into her flesh and the note written in 19th century code seems to cast a shadow on ancient Mormon laws. Already wary of outsiders, the last thing the Latter-Day Saints church needs is bad publicity.

Journalist Selonnah Zee is assigned to cover the story--and it quickly grows out of control. Within days, more victims appear in disturbing succession surrounded by symbols and clues.

Selonnah's cousin Roger has recently converted to Mormonism but his wife, Eliza is beginning to doubt the faith of her childhood. If something is really from God, she wonders, why does it need to be constantly revised? Might the murderer be asking the same question? And who might be the next victim?

Why did the murderer use the old Mormon Code based on Brigham Young's Deseret Alphabet? And what is the meaning of all the dead bodies carefully displayed and the strange markings? If you were an insider you knew it had to be covered up, but for Selonnah, a criminal justice graduate turned journalist, it became a puzzle to be mastered. Perhaps an answer is finally reached why the murderer and others like the old ways, but the church chose to be modernized.

This is definitely a page turner all the way to the surprising end.

At the back of the book are questions for study and insights brought out in this well written and fascinating book.

You can view a trailer of the book at www.latayne.com

Author's Bio

LaTayne C. Scott was a Mormon for ten yeas, attending Brigham Young University and working s a staff member for two of BYU's weekly magazines. After her conversion to Christianity, she authored thirteen published books and has also published articles, reviews, and poems. She is the recipient of Pepperdine University's Distinguished Christian Service Award for creative Christian writing. She is a full-time writer and lives in New Mexico with her husband. She has two adult children.

Book Review - The Unseen by T. L. Hines

Power suspense writer, T. L. Hines pushes the adrenaline pump at just the right intervals to create a gasp but not cardiac arrest with well-crafted words in his latest book, The Unseen. A must read if you like a thriller that is closer to life than the fiction it purports to be.

The Unseen is a web of deceit and exploitation; exposing plots within plots of possible espionage, intrigue, government cover-up, or could it simply be a matter of greed? Hines takes the reader on a ride through the underground tunnels of Washington DC, visiting the old parts of the city, into buildings that have no registered tenants yet security at the doors. Then, of course, there are the walls behind walls revealing even more mystery as the watcher suddenly becomes the watched.

When one of the watchers, Lucas, hears something unusual in his underground home, he comes face to face with someone obviously out of place with a strange request. Lucas only wanted to be helpful and quickly get this stranger out of his domain. The red flag that went off in Lucas' mind initially but was over ridden by the desire to be helpful and most of all to prove that he was the real creeper, not this come lately stranger.

The next day, however, Lucas finds he had experienced a home invasion, and it was not the rats that also occupied the underground hamlet. Lucas begins looking for the stranger from the night before. Dishwasher by profession, with a mind that understands security, electronics, and a deep thinker prefers the shadows where he feels safe. We don't get the whole story until the very end of the book. What an ending! Electrifying from the first word to the last. Closing the book, one sits and ponders—was that really fiction?