The Overseer - Softcover

Rabb, Jonathan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 051512558X ISBN 13: 9780515125580

Publisher: Penguin, 1999

Synopsis

When a document, written by a long-dead Swiss monk, containing a master plan for world domination, falls into the hands of the ruthless Overseer cabal and they launch a campaign of world terror, a beautiful government agent joins forces with a brilliant young political theorist to stop them. Reprint.

About this title

From the Publisher

From Publishers Weekly, April 27, 1998
A U.S. agent and a Columbia University professor race to find a 16th century manuscript in this intriguing debut thriller. Rabb imagines a Swiss monk named Eisenreich, a contemporary of Machievelli's who wrote a long-suppressed book called On Supremacy, an outline for world conquest that goes far beyond the ruminations of The Prince. When a group of conservative ideologues decides to put a modern version of the plan into action, the task of stopping them falls to undercover agent Sarah Trent (who worked for several members of the right-wing committee's inner sanctum during an earlier phase of her espionage career) and Xander Jaspers, a brilliant young academic who eventually unravels the intricacies of the plan. The cabal is led by the myserious "overseer" of the title; his minions include a Limbaugh-like demagogue, a brainwashing "educator" in charge of producing footsoldiers to carry out the plan and a prominent conservative financier. Trent and Jaspers are a quirky, entertaining couple, and their hunt for the historical prize incorporates many tightly written scenes (although the scenes in which Trent and Jaspers are captured and recaptured tend to blur together). The satisfying climax reveals the surprising identity of the overseer; meanwhile, there's plenty of intellectual meat in Rabb's description of the origins of the manuscript and implications of the plan. Using an innovative conceit that combines imaginative brainwork and stirring action scenes, Rabb has given us a thriller worth remembering.

About the Author

Jonathan Rabb has a B.A. from Yale and an M.Phil from Columbia University in political theory and taught at Columbia College for three years, specializing in early modern political thought. He had the idea for The Overseer while on a Fulbright fellowship in Germany. Rabb lives in New York City.

Edition details

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 051512558X
• ISBN 13: 9780515125580
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 480