Customer Reviews

Tablets of Ararat

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The Tablets of Ararat by C. J. Illinik is a brilliantly conceived novel. The story line is solid. The historical detail is rich. The food is well described, unlike many novels I have read. The characters are lively and intriguing, though they sometimes do inconsistent things.

The book is more of a braided novel, or a series of short stories that set the stage for a novella, than a novel that tells a single story. However, that is not really accurate. The story being told is the story of a corner of a tablet on which Noah had inventoried the animals on the ark. This being so, we follow the story of the corner through time and space. Up to the point of around the 1960's. At that point, we pick up the story of Arianna Arista and her cohorts in their quest that leads them to find two more tablets. The story really picks up at this point - the first 150+ pages covers the story of the corner, the final 200+/- pages tell the story of Arianna et. al.

I read 195 pages before discovering that this book actually was Christian fiction. However, the reader will find more characters in the book praising Allah (Turkish Muslims), than Christians praising Yahweh. The book seems to lend credibility to the idea that the two are actually the same. So, the reader should read with caution and discretion.

One annoying aspect of the book is that the author very frequently uses italicized foreign words, followed by a brief explanation in English. Personally, just using the English would have contributed greatly to the flow of the book.

One glaring error comes when the author writes that St. Paul baptized Cornelius. The statement is footnoted with Acts 10, which plainly tells us the Peter, not Paul, baptized Cornelius.

At one point, the author throws in comments about women's issues in Turkey. A comment is made by one character that demeans women who do want to be housewives.

There are several places in the book where information in the story conflicts with other information the reader has already been given. An example of this is when Morgan strips to his shorts and swims to a boat to save Arianna. While on the boat, he kicks in a door with his size 13 boot. I would think boots would make the swimming difficult. Several more lapses like this are present in the book.

All in all the story is conceptualized brilliantly. It kept my interest throughout. I think many readers will enjoy the book, but I did want to share the comments above. I hope this author continues to write, maybe even the sequel that this book leaves hints of. If you buy this book, I hope you enjoy it immensely. However, if you are like me, you will find yourself annoyed at some aspects of the book.

Tablets is a thoroughly intriguing read, comparable to James Michener and Leon Uris. CJ Illinik's writing style easily captures both men and women readers and the premise is plausible with the characters both colorful and developed. Anyone who has lived or explored in Turkey will enjoy the descriptions of different Asia Minor cultures over the centuries. I particularly enjoyed the Gregorian monk character. I look forward to reading more from CJ Illinik.

The Tablets Of Ararat is an original novel by C. J. Illinik and based upon a fascinating premise: What if Noah, the ark-builder of Biblical history, left behind a record of his life and work that survived to the modern day? Arianna is an American archaeologist who discovers ancient tablets in Turkey. Her find could create overwhelming potential repercussions for traditional Judeo/Christian faiths and doctrines. Arianna soon finds herself at a crossroads, with a possible romance on one side, and on the other, a lethal danger from men determined to exploit both her and the tablets. The Tablets Of Ararat is an unique and original, superbly written, thoroughly fascinating, thought provoking, and enthusiastically recommended drama.

Anyone interested in archeology should love this book. Well written. Characters are difficult to follow at times, but no more so than certain other best selling authors. It captures one's interest and is hard to put down.

Anyone interested in archeology should love this book. Well written. Characters are difficult to follow at times, but no more so than certain other best selling authors. It captures one's interest and is hard to put down.

I picked up "The Tablets of Ararat" after skimming the information on the cover. I love historical fiction, particularly Biblical fiction, and "Tablets" promised to be a wonderful read. To my surprise, there is actually very little of the book devoted to the Tablets themselves, after the first few pages. As other reviews have indicated, it is, instead, a (not very well put-together) series of stories that totally confuse the reader, skipping from the 1960's, to the time of Noah, to the 11th Centry, to the 1800s, back to the 1960s, and so on. The character's names are difficult to follow at times, and keep track of "who's who". But for almost 350 pages, I kept wondering "Am I ever going to read anything significant about the Tablets???"

As I read, it was quite apparent to me that the author was a woman. (Please forgive this -- it is not intended to be chauvanistic, but simply a "Women Are From Venus" observation.) Rather than focus on what should have been the chief topic -- and what could have made a fantastically exciting and spell-binding novel -- she spends most of her time on romances, relationships, and superficial "window dressing".

What was also apparent is that the author has a fairly good grasp of historic Turkey -- and left no stone unturned in making the readers aware of that. Constant references to Turkish phrases (many left untranslated), Turkish customs, Turkish home life, Turkish history, etc., left me wondering if the novel was merely a simple guise for a "Look how much I know about Turkey" book.

As others have noted, there were inconsistencies in the book. Perhaps the greatest of all -- and for those who don't want to read a spoiler, you may wish to stop here -- was the ending. The title (and supposed focus) of the book is the Tablets that Noah is imagined to have created just before the Flood. Thousands of years old -- and in Noah's own handwriting! -- these would be some of the greatest archeological finds in all of history. Yet at the end of the book -- AFTER discovering two of the Tablets and having them stolen from them -- the main characters have not one, but several, opportunities to get them back... but casually dismiss those chances in favor of romancing each other! The entire book attempts to "create" a history for the Tablets... and then simply lets them go. This was one of the most disappointing endings I have ever read in a book of this kind.

I could go on, agreeing with the others about historical inaccuracies, self-imposed language barriers, over-exceessive attention to the "relationships" (a.k.a. "romances"), but it's already been said.

The only reason I finished the book was in the on-going hope that EVENTUALLY it would get better. EVENTUALLY the Tablets would take center-stage -- as the book's cover would make one suppose. EVENTUALLY the author would tire of telling us every little aspect of Turkish day-to-day humdrum life. I was wrong.

It never did get better. But it did get worse.