Review of The Secret of Glaston Tor by Martin Blake

We are all aware that a whole generation of those who grew up in the sixties and seventies, often educated at Catholic schools, have abandoned the Faith. Like the Labour spokesman they no longer ‘do God’. Their culture is atheistic (though still influenced by Christianity), and Dawkins speaks more to them than Christ or his Church. But it would seem that their children’s generation show more interest in orthodox religion, and admiration for Tolkien’s masterpieces and the Narnia Chronicles of C.S. Lewis is still strong.  It is to them that the ‘New Evangelisation’ will apeal.

A new series of stories directed chiefly at teenagers has  just been launched by Donal Anthony Foley of ‘Theotokos Books’.  The first of the Chronicles of Glastonbury was published this year and  should prove a useful tool in the New Evangelisation. ‘The Secret of Glaston Tor’ is well written and gives an exciting account of the adventures of three young cousins – one American and two English – who are taken back mystically in time from 2015 to 1940 in France under the German occupation, where for five days they accompany an ever growing party of refugees attempting to leave France for Britain.

These include allied airmen shot down over France, a Jewish Catholic lady married to a German and their sick five year old son, a former communist youth who plays the part of ‘baddy’, and one or two others.  To find out how they achieve escaping to England you must read the book.  Without overdoing the religious element Foley makes this a deeply Christian story, and it should complement the Harry Potter series that are so secular.

The dialogue is well handled, and is particularly compelling in the scenes where the cousins are arrested in Paris by Gestapo agents from whom they manage to escape.

As Joseph Pearce writes in his recommendation on the back cover: “The Secret of Glaston Tor is a gripping yarn that has all the ingredients any adventurous reader could desire.  Time travel, wartime adventure, interrogation by the secret police, a desperate attempt to escape from France against all the odds.  And it’s all woven together with a golden thread of religious truth.  Who could ask for more?”