The Last Testament by Sam Bourne

It’s time to talk about The Last Testament after The Righteous Man. 

Let’s get the synopsis out of the way :

An Iraqi boy loots an ancient clay tablet from a long-forgotten vault in the Baghdad Museum of Antiquities.


At a rally for the signing of a historic deal between Israel and Palestinians, an assassin pushes through the crowd towards the Israeli PM. Bodyguards shoot the man dead. But in his hand there’s no gun : only a blood-stained note .


A series of apparently random killings follows as tensions boil over, Washington calls in star peace negotiator Maggie Costello. Maggie finds herself in an impossible situation, especially when she discovers the murders are not random. Someone is killing archaeologists and historians – those with secret knowledge of the ancient past.

*stare blankly*

I actually don’t know where to start. It’s actually quite a confusing book for me. First, readers have to take note of timeline and venue. To compute these into some form of sequence can be quite challenging for my brain cells which would normally be half functioning when I read. (hahah…well, we read to relax, right?) I found myself having to flip back to the earlier pages just to get a sense of the sequence. Sometimes the timeline is in months and sometimes just over a few hours so, yes, too complicating for me.

Maggie Costello being the main lead in the story is not a very endearing character. I was quite annoyed with her time and again. Having fouled up her last negotiation case, she went on sabbatical and took up couples counseling back in Washington. She thought that she can redeem herself by agreeing to take up this case and travel to Tel Aviv. The very reason that she was taken off the last case was the very reason that she’s been assigned this particularly case although she was not aware of it initially. I didn’t like Maggie Costello at the beginning of the book and I didn’t like her toward the end.

If you like politics and thriller, then this would be up your alley. Unfortunately, I felt I took a wrong turn with this one.