With her super-sensitive sense of smell, sixteen-year-old Kaia is used to not fitting in. Add to that the pills she's becoming dependent on, the recent death of both of her parents, and having to live with an aunt with whom she has nothing in common, and Kaia is ready for a change. So when she receives an invitation from Dr. Vadim Grigori to participate in the Grigori Young Scholars Program (GYSP) with its promise that she will meet others like herself, she jumps at the chance.
Her leap turns out to be a high-dive into mystery. The faculty of the GYSP exhibits more than an academic interest in the ancient story of the fall of the Watchers from the apocryphal 1 Enoch. Not only are the Grigoris interested in this myth, they're obsessed by an element named in the story: antimony, useful to humans throughout history and now crucial to our everyday existence, but maybe even more vital to the Grigoris. Why are they so interested in it? What lengths will they go to get control of the earth's supply? And what role will GYSP participants like Kaia play in their plans?
Antimony means not alone. Togetherness sounds great, but it all depends on whether you join up with the winning side . . .
Amy E. Richter is an Episcopal priest and author of Enoch and the Gospel of Matthew (2012). Along with Joseph S. Pagano, she is coauthor of Love in Flesh and Bone (2014) and A Man, A Woman, A Word of Love (2012), and coeditor of Common Prayer: Reflections on Episcopal Worship (2019). She currently resides in South Africa where she serves with Episcopal Volunteers in Mission.
"Crisply and intelligently written with a deeply creative engagement with Scripture, Amy Richter's Antimony is an entirely fresh take on religious fiction. Her graceful, muscular prose is so evocative and precise sometimes that to read this book is to have a full-bodied sensory experience. Antimony's sympathetic cast of young characters mingles with figures and stories from Jewish apocalyptic, the Hebrew Bible, and the Gospels for a delightfully unexpected, time-bending story of memory, mystery, and friendship."
--Jennifer Newsome Martin, Assistant Professor, Program of Liberal Studies & Theology, University of Notre Dame
"This is one of the best novels I've read in a long time. It was a beautifully written, insanely entertaining, thought-provoking story that sucked me in from page one."
--Jamie McLaughlin, television writer and producer
"With compelling characters and relentless revelations, Richter weaves a suspenseful mystery from threads of myth, history, science, and faith. Those who grew up reading Lewis and Rowling will love her band of brilliant high schoolers striving to uncover the dark secrets of Harvard Divinity School and its shadowy masters. Fresh, fun, and not a little frightening, Antimony is a feverish page-turner."
--J. Robert King, author of the Mad Merlin Trilogy