Book & Audio Review: Jovah's Angel by Sharon Shinn

Jovah's Angel
Author: Sharon Shinn
Narrator: Tamara Marston
Series: Angel (Book 2)
Publication: Ace (April 1, 1998); Audible Studios (July 20, 2010)
Length: 365 p.; 15 hours and 31 minutes

Description: National bestselling author Sharon Shinn returns to the compelling world of Samaria in an extraordinary novel of angels and mortals, music and mystery, science and faith...

More than a hundred years after the time of Rachel and Gabriel, Samaria is in deep turmoil. Charismatic Archangel Delilah has been injured and forced to give up her position, and she has been replaced by shy, uncertain Alleluia. What’s worse, ungovernable storms are sweeping across the country, and the god never seems to hear the angels’ pleas to abate the bad weather. Unless those prayers are offered by the new Archangel...

My Thoughts: One hundred and fifty years have passed since the events of ARCHANGEL and Samaria is undergoing something of an industrial revolution. They are also enduring very difficult weather conditions and Jovah seemingly isn't hearing angelic requests for weather interventions.

Worst of all, the current Archangel Delilah and her escort are caught in a terrible storm which kills a number of them and damages Delilah's wing so that she can no longer fly. Alleluia, a quiet scholarly angel, is named by Jovah to be the new Archangel. She feels vastly underqualified for her new position. 

When the final music player fails, she begins to hunt for an engineer to see if it can be repaired. She finds Caleb Augustus who is a man of science and who has lost his faith in Jovah as the result of an experiment with electricity the killed his father and damaged the Kiss embedded in his right arm at his birth which dedicated him to Jovah. 

Meanwhile, Alleluia has to search for the man who will be her angelico and perform at the upcoming Gloria. The only problem is that the oracles are getting very vague answers when they query Jovah about him. All they are told is that he is a son of Jeremiah which isn't nearly enough to locate him in time. It does spur Alleluia's interest in the oracles and the way they communicate with Jovah. She learns the language needed and makes her own queries at Mount Sinai which no longer has an oracle based there. 

Her enquiries lead her to being teleported to the ship orbiting Samaria where she learns that the people are being guided, not by a deity, but by a computer programmed to assist the settlers. And that computer is in need of repair which is why the angels aren't being heard when they pray to Jovah. Luckily, Caleb is able to make the repairs and learn even more of the technology that the settlers had abandoned.

But the discovery of the spaceship has thrown Alleluia into a crisis of faith that has dented her view of her world and her purpose on it. 

This was an engaging story that neatly blends science and faith into a very compelling book. The characters, especially Alleluia, have many hard decisions to make. This is the second book in a five book series. I can't wait to find out what happens next on Samaria.

Favorite Quote:

"Men have always, through the centuries, found ways to create what they did not find in the natural order. And men have always, through the centuries, sought to put themselves in the context of the universe. The universe has remained too vast for them to quantify. Thus they hypothesize and entity even more vast as a vessel to contain it."

I bought this one. You can buy your copy here.