Nicolas Notovitch and the tale of his lost gospel are real. It was my fascination with him and his motives that resulted in this book. Its method – slapdash, wilful, knowingly anachronistic – will not conceal my vast ignorance of many of the subjects I’ve touched upon. I’ve been guided by the precepts of Novalis and Tolstoy, who said, respectively: ‘Novels arise out of the shortcomings of history,’ and ‘History would be an excellent thing if only it were true.’ I blame Flaubert among others for propagating the misconception that stories exist and writers find the best way to tell them. I believe that writers – and in this sense, we are all writers – construct everything, including their own identities as writers.

It wasn’t until 1965 that the Second Vatican Council issued the document Nostra Aetate, which included these words: ‘What happened in His passion cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today. Although the Church is the new people of God, the Jews should not be presented as rejected or accursed by God, as if this followed from the Holy Scriptures.’

In case any ambiguity remains: my great-uncle Leonard Castle was killed in action in 1916.

If you close this book moderately entertained, more suspicious of assertions of expertise and alerted to the seepage of the modes of fiction into areas of life that conventionally claim to be concerned only with the facts, then I’ve exceeded every hope I had for the book. The method I commend to you, though perhaps the outcome of such an exercise is already obvious at the outset: pursue someone, anyone, into the worlds that might have been, and the soul you glimpse can only be your own.

About the Author

Marcel Theroux is the author of four previous novels: The Paperchase, winner of the 2002 Somerset Maugham Award; A Blow to the Heart; Far North, which was shortlisted for America’s prestigious National Book Award; and Strange Bodies. He lives in London.

Also by the Author

A BLOW TO THE HEART

THE PAPERCHASE

A STRANGER IN THE EARTH

FAR NORTH

STRANGE BODIES

Copyright

First published in the UK in 2017
by Faber & Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74–77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA

This ebook edition first published in 2017

Cover design by Faber
Illustration by MAX-O-MATIC

The right of Marcel Theroux to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

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