Eye Witness (Book One): A Fictional Tale of Absolute Truth

by Robert James Luedke

Book Overview

Amid the violence and chaos of the present day Middle East, a remarkably preserved first century document is discovered by seismic researchers beneath the foundations of present day Jerusalem. None of... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0975892401
• ISBN13: 9780975892404
• Release Date: August 2004
• Publisher: Head Press Publishing
• Length: 96 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.2" x 8.6" x 10.5"

Customer Reviews

Eyewitness Trilogy Review

I think your scripting is great! The contemporary speech makes it a lot easier to understand. I really like your art style which is somewhat unique, but similar to Mark Bagley who use to do Spider-Man and the New Warriors. I think it would indeed hold the attention of young and old folks alike, as it did mine. I could hardly put the books down even though my schedule limited me to only a few minutes reading per sitting. The covers: I like the cover on the first one best because it was your art and similar to the interior just enhanced. What would have made it better, I think, is to have used that cover as a background and have Dr Harper and Raj in the foreground opening the ancient box containing the eyewitness scrolls. The other 2 covers are traditional Christian paintings which appeal to traditionalists. Maybe you have to do that to sell them in today's market. I find that ironic considering how radical the teaching of Jesus, Paul and the beginnings of Christianity were in the day.

Grabbing the youth

I think this is a great method to reach out to the youth of today. A teen is likely to read this novel and have their interest peaked.

What if they found another gospel today?

What would happen if another document containing the eyewitness account of the last week of Christ's life was found today? Would it change the world to know there was another source of testimony to the validity of the gospels? Author Robert James Luedke has tackled this possibility in his graphic novel Eyewitness. Doctor Terry Harper finds himself whisked across the globe at the request of the mysterious Joshua Rabin. Once there, he discovers that Rabin's team has discovered an ancient text inside an ossuary. No one else on Rabin's team has been able to translate it, thus the need for Harper's help. Within hours, Harper has the text deciphered and begins to read an eyewitness account of the last week of Christ's life. While we already have this in the gospels, this one is especially important because it's the first non-biblical source to corroborate the other versions of the story. Over the process of reading this moving text, Harper finds himself questioning his own beliefs and lack of faith. I've been a comic book fan for almost thirty years and have a huge collection. I still remember the old Christian comics that came out in the mid-80's in an attempt to reach the modern market with the gospel message. Most were either too preachy or too amateur to reach anyone outside the Christian market. This self-published effort by Luedke does more to present the message in an interesting way than anything put out in a long time. While visualizing the Passion isn't something new, Luedke's pull on this is the incredibly detailed amount of research he's done into every aspect of society at the time of Christ. I was given more information in these pages than in many Bible Handbooks and study Bibles I've read. While the artwork here couldn't be confused with the "big boys" in the mainstream, it's good and pulls the story along at a tight pace. He also includes a glossary of terms and a map of Jesus's travels through Jerusalem. While I was familiar with almost all of it, it's easy to see where they would help someone new to the story keep up. The story starts out with a good "hook" and keeps you into it. Unfortunately, I could easily see a few places where a professional editor could have helped. There are a few distracting spelling errors (for example, one major character's name is spelled two different ways in the same panel), and the tone of the book gets a little out of whack sometimes by touches of humor that are out of place (for example, after Peter cuts off the soldier's ear, the soldier says "Scuse me, has anyone seen my ear?"; at the Last Supper, John is called a "Rabbi's Pet" because he's the "beloved disciple", etc). These sometimes odd stretches for humor detracted from the story for me. Also, Robert has taken a little liberty with the gospels that I didn't follow (Mary, the mother of Jesus, appears in the Garden of Gethsemene during that final prayer to comfort Jesus; Judas talks to Jesus on the cross where Jesus tells him he had no choice i