The Twelve by William Gladstone (audio)

Overview from Barnes and Noble:

The Twelve is a novel about a most unusual and unsuspecting hero. As a child, Max lives in a world of colors and numbers, not speaking until the age of six. As an adult, Max ventures on a journey of destiny to discover the secret behind the ancient Mayan prophecy about the “end of time,” foretold to occur on December 21, 2012.

At fifteen years old, Max has a near-death experience during which he has a vision that reveals the names of the twelve unique individuals. While Max cannot discern the significance of the twelve names he is unable to shake the sense that they have deep meaning. After completing his schooling at Harvard and Yale, eight years pass before Max meets the first of The Twelve.

With this first meeting, Max’s voyage of discovery begins, as he strives to uncover the identities and roles of the twelve individuals he will meet during his journey toward the truth. All of The Twelve seem connected, and all of them are important to what will happen at the exact moment the world as we know it will end.

The novel take the reader on a serious of spectacular adventures to Jerusalem, Athens, London, India, Istanbul, China, Japan, and Mexico, culminating in a understanding of why and how Max and The Twelve are destined to unite and discover the true meaning of December 21, 2012.

The outcome of their meeting could fulfill an ancient Mayan prophecy, controlling the future of life on our planet. Only The Twelve can provide the answers, as the fate of all humanity rests in the balance.

 

My thoughts:

I wasn't paying enough attention when I downloaded this book from the library online audio books.  I saw the title and thought it was past of Justin Cronin's series.  I spent my first treadmill run wondering when the vampire/zombie people were going to show up!  It turns out it was for the best since The Twelve is not the first book in Cronin's series.

 

This book was a bit slow moving for me and I felt like the author did a lot of telling instead of letting his story unfold naturally, he gave a lot of information about characters and what they were thinking instead of revealing it through scenes.  I listened to three quarters of it and then took a break for a week, finally deciding that I might as well see how it all played out since I had listened to more than half of it already.

 

The metaphysical aspects and the explanation of the Mayan prophesy were nicely done, but overall I was just ready for the book to be done.  I didn't feel connected to any of the characters, it felt like the book lacked an emotional connection to the reader and the characters seemed to lack one with each other.  Max kept getting engaged and having it not work out, but his heart was never broken, he just kept moving forward.  It was a good concept, but disappointing in the end.

Product Details

• ISBN-13: 9781937856892
• Publisher: BenBella Books, Inc.
• Publication date: 10/30/2012
• Sold by: Barnes & Noble
• Format: eBook
• Pages: 288

Meet the Author

William Gladstone is coauthor of the books Tapping the Source and The Golden Motorcycle Gang and author of the international bestselling novel, The Twelve. Gladstone is considered an international expert on indigenous cultures and the meaning of 2012. He is also coproducer of the highly acclaimed film Tapping the Source.

As a literary agent, Gladstone has worked with some of the most respected and influential authors of our time, including Eckhart Tolle, Deepak Chopra, and Barbara Marx Hubbard. As a pioneer in the publishing industry, he contributed to the creation of the first print-on-demand book publishing company as well as the first ebook company. Throughout his career, Gladstone has worked with prominent visionaries, including Tom Anderson, founder of Myspace; Peter Norton, founder of Norton Computing; and Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux operating system.

Gladstone is a trustee of the International Club of Budapest whose honorary members include the Dalai Lama, Dr. Jane Goodall, and Mikhail Gorbachev. Gladstone has served on the boards of public and private companies and was the founding president of the Alumni Association for School Year Abroad, based in Andover, Mass. He attended Yale College and earned a graduate degree in cultural anthropology from Harvard University.