The Lost Staff
A Female Indiana Jones in the Making and a Secretive Vatican Archaeological Agency
On her dismal 30th birthday, unassuming Professor Mackenzie Braden receives a mysterious package from her Aunt Sara, urging her to locate Moses’ staff. The most powerful weapon in history will start global chaos if it lands in the wrong hands. Sara was an agent for VAS, the top-secret Vatican Archaeological Service. But she’s been dead for 30 years and the agency inactive for just as long. Except for hunky ex-military pilot Eoin Reilly, her allies are wannabe agents who are as inept as she is.
But nothing is going to stop Mackenzie from recharging her lackluster life, fulfilling her mission, finding answers about her aunt, and making Eoin her birthday present. Armed with her only clue, a souvenir figurine of Moses and his rod, Mackenzie sets off on a wild adventure as she fends off a Ph.D. candidate turned terrorist, a dysfunctional family of treasure hunters, a fake Mossad operative, a manic former VAS agent, the underground tunnels of the Gaza Strip, and a whole lot of rocket launchers. But this is training for Mackenzie’s ultimate clash with a charming deposed Saudi prince with world domination on his mind.
The Alchemist Sisters
It’s Christmas and Mackenzie Braden, numero uno agent for the secretive Vatican Archaeological Service (VAS) is visited by a saint, aka Giovanni Velita. Giovanni needs Mackenzie to locate the precious hay from the first nativity scene held in 1223 Italy. The hay has miraculous healing powers, but it was hidden by her Aunt Sara, who is now dead. The CEO of a global pharmaceutical company also wants the hay to rent out for top dollars and sets his goons after Giovanni and Mackenzie.
But Cardinal Miriam of Balthazar, a 900-year-old alchemist needs the hay to lead her to Jesus’ creche. Water drunk from the creche is the elixir of life. With the creche, Miriam will overthrow the Vatican and create a select order of immortal humans. That is if her estranged and equally ancient alchemist sisters don’t get to it first and use it for their own scheming desires.
In a wild race through Toronto, Italy, Iraq, Nazareth, and ancient Babylon, Mackenzie and her crew of amateurish VAS agents search for the hay and creche before they land in the wrong hands and create global and spiritual chaos.
