Eternal Life by Dara Horn
Eternal Life by Dara Horn
"Rachel is a mother living in first century Jerusalem, who makes a pact with God in order for her son to recover from an illness: if he lives she will not be able to die. The story from there moves back and forth between her life in ancient Jerusalem and present day America, where she is an elderly widow dealing with her youngest son's failures. Horn has written a great meditation on the meaning of death and life, family, faith, and parenthood. An impressive and Entertaining book." - Recommended by Wayne
Rachel is a woman with a problem: she can't die. Her recent troubles--widowhood, a failing business, an unemployed middle-aged son--are only the latest in a litany spanning dozens of countries, scores of marriages, and hundreds of children. In the 2,000 years since she made a spiritual bargain to save the life of her first son back in Roman-occupied Jerusalem, she's tried everything to free herself, and only one other person in the world understands: a man she once loved passionately, who has been stalking her through the centuries, convinced they belong together forever.
But as the twenty-first century begins and her children and grandchildren--consumed with immortality in their own ways, from the frontiers of digital currency to genetic engineering--develop new technologies that could change her fate and theirs, Rachel knows she must find a way out.