Terry Brennan Interview

Q: How long have you been writing and what other careers or jobs have you had?
A. I’ve been writing since I was a freshman in high school. So I’ve been writing for 60 years. Yikes! I didn’t become a ‘professional’ writer until 1970 when I took my first newspaper job as a sportswriter. But I didn’t become a writer of novels until 1994, when I wrote my first manuscript – one which I wouldn’t dare show to a publisher today. However, I didn’t get serious about fiction writing until 2005 when I took an idea to my first writer’s conference. That idea evolved into my first novel, The Sacred Cipher.
As far as careers, I was a journalist for 22 years, from 1970 to 1992, starting as a sportswriter. In 1982 I moved from writing into newspaper management – editor for a newspaper in Pennsylvania; publisher for newspapers in Illinois and upstate New York; executive editor of an international chain of 400 newspapers in the US, Ireland and England. Leading a team while editor of the Mercury in Pottstown, PA we won a Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing. In 1996 I moved into the nonprofit field and, for 20 years, worked for two nonprofit organizations that provided help and hope for homeless people in New York City.

Q: Would you tell us about your current book release Persian Betrayal?
A: Three ancient empires are rushing toward a collision in the volatile Middle East; an official high in the US State Department is conspiring with a foreign power against the US President; a centuries-old prophecy is unveiled that herald’s Christ’s imminent return; and malevolent created eternal beings – fallen angels – are determined to invalidate Biblical prophecy so they can manufacture a different ending to the Bible … reverse the outcome of the battle of Armageddon.
In Ishmael Covenant, the first book of the EMPIRES OF ARMAGEDDON series, Diplomatic Security Service agent Brian Mullaney is banished to Israel to protect new US Ambassador Joseph Atticus Cleveland. Mullaney and the ambassador are thrust into the cauldron of Middle East conflict, both political, spiritual and personal. They come into possession of an ancient, lethal metal box that supposedly holds a second prophecy written by the Vilna Gaon, an historically reknowned Talmudic scholar.
Revelation of the Gaon’s prophecy could threaten both the nascent peace treaty between Israel and all its Arab neighbors – the Ishmael Covenant – and also reveal the insidious plot of their evil enemy, an other-worldly creature called the Turk. Mullaney finds himself fighting for the life of the ambassador and his daughter, fighting for his own crippled marriage, and fighting a spiritual battle, for which he is unprepared, against the agents of evil who are determined to destroy the box, the prophecy and the Middle East as we know it.
The story in Persian Betrayal commences exactly where Ishmael Covenant ends, with the destruction of the Hurva Synagogue in Jerusalem by agents of the Turk, who is still trying to destroy the prophecy of the Vilna Gaon and the lethal metal box that protects it. Mullaney finds himself propelled into the midst of a spiritual battle that is manifested in the physical realm: the Turk’s Disciples leave death and destruction in their wake as they attack the US Embassy and the Ambassador’s Residence in Tel Aviv at the same time, but fail to secure the box of power; Ambassador Cleveland goes AWOL – without his security detail – to confront Turkish President Emet Kashani about the rumors of a Turkish attempt to steal the nuclear weapons at the Incirlik Air Base; and Mullaney is enlisted by an eight-foot angel to become the Final Guardian of the Gaon’s lethal box.

Q: Where did you get your inspiration for this story?
A: For a long time, I had been harboring an idea that events unfolding over the last several years gave every indication that three ancient empires of the Middle East – the Persian, Ottoman and Islamic empires – could very possibly rise again. And I wondered how the conflict of these ascendant empires could impact world history, and our future.
One afternoon, my wife, Andrea, and I ran the idea of the rebirth of these three ancient empires, and the peace treaty which I had invented between Israel and its Arab neighbors, the Ishmael Covenant, past Nick Uva. Nick is the Associate Pastor at Harvest Time Church in Greenwich, CT, a profound teacher and man of great Biblical understanding. We spent a couple of hours knocking those ideas around, considering their implications under the lens of Biblical prophecy and measuring them against a number of end-times scenarios. And then Pastor Nick asked, “Have you ever heard of the Vilna Gaon?”
No. But it didn’t take me long to look him up.
The history of the Vilna Gaon – and his prophecy that was revealed in 2014 – combined with the possibility of rebirth for these three ancient empires, provided the spark of inspiration that got the story line flowing.

Q: What is the main thing you hope readers remember from this story?
A: Two of the themes that drive this series are, first, the theme of spiritual warfare and, second, how that spiritual warfare plays out on the world stage.
My personal Bible is a 1985 version of the NIV Study Bible given to me by my wife. The Study Bible has in-depth explanatory notes on nearly every page. In reading the book of Ephesians, I came to the line in Ephesians 1:3 where Paul mentions “heavenly realms” for the first of five times in the book. This is part of what the NIV study note says:
“… in the Christian’s union with the exalted Christ, ultimate issues are involved … At stake are God’s eternal eschatological purpose and the titanic conflict between God and the powerful spiritual forces arrayed against him …. As a result, the spiritual struggles of the saints here and now is not so much against ‘flesh and blood’ as against the great spiritual forces that war against God in heaven.”
I hope that readers of the EMPIRES OF ARMAGEDDON series come to understand that Christians are in a real, tangible war here on earth and that they are part of the “titanic conflict between God and the powerful spiritual forces arrayed against him.” I was struck by the idea that there are great spiritual forces that war against God in heaven. Interesting thought. More sobering is the idea that my ‘spiritual struggles’ here on earth have, in some way, an impact on that war in heaven.

Q: How do you choose your settings for your books?
A. Mostly, I try to write a lot about what I know. My six books thus far have all been set, ultimately, in the Middle East. The JERUSALEM PROPHECIES series is rooted, at the start, in New York City (where we lived for 10 years) before heading to Jerusalem and the EMPIRES OF ARMAGEDDON series is launched from the Washington DC area (where I once worked and we’ve visited regularly) before landing in Istanbul, Tel Aviv, Amman and Ankara. Since my books are often tagged “end-times-thrillers” it’s understandable that a great deal of the stories play out on the stage of Israel and the rest of the Middle East.

Q: Do you base your characters on people you know or are they totally made up?
A: A few of the characters in my first series of novels, JERUSALEM PROPHECIES, were drawn from people I know, or knew then. Some of me was in the protagonist, Tom Bohannon. Some of my wife was in his wife. Some of the NYC chief of police at the time was in the character Rory O’Neill. As a fledgling author I drew on people, places, things that I knew. But I also stretched myself to create a character, Sammy Rizzo, who was a dwarf – and a New York wise guy
But for this second series, EMPIRES OF ARMAGEDDON, all of the characters are totally made up and very much not like me … two black American men; a Jewish rabbi, a Greek monk/computer hacker; a Lithuanian Talmudic scholar from the 18th century and two angels – one a fallen agent of evil, the other a captain of the heavenly host. The two black men – one an African-American and the other a Caribbean-American –were a personal challenge. I did a lot of study, a lot of talking, and a lot more listening to try and make sure I represented their lives as accurately as I could. And that I could present the issues, like systemic racism, that a black man in America deals with every day.

Q: Would you share with us what you are working on now?
A. I am twisting and turning and looking for direction.

I’m in the final stages of completing something totally different for me … a non-fiction book with the working title of, Rescuing the Hidden Hearts of Men. I think it may be the most important thing I’ve ever written. For more than 30 years I’ve been chronicling my early morning prayer conversations with God in one of many journals. This book, Rescuing the Hidden Hearts of Men, which has intimidated me since I started it, was born out of themes God shared with me in my journaling over the past few years. I hope it gets published.

Also, I’m presently working on two fiction manuscripts that I wrote many years ago that need some significant work to get them into viable shape (one about a rogue priest who plans to kidnap the Pope). And I’m in the early stages of a mystery/thriller that spans three generations of Irish people – from a farmer in the Great Hunger, through emigration to New York City to an early 20th century NYPD detective – that may have its roots in my family’s farm on Lough Neagh in County Armagh.

Q: If money were no object what vacation would you like to take and why?
A. Three stops. First, as much for Andrea as for me – back to Jerusalem for a couple of weeks just to soak up the animate presence in that amazing city. Not only is Jerusalem (and Israel) the central location for many of my books, but also the history of the city – from ancient to modern – and its monuments are awesomely inspiring.

Second stop would be a couple of weeks to return to Paris for the third time. Preferably in the early-Fall season, after the tourists and before the cold rains. Breakfast in one of the myriad pastry shops that dot the city; lazy lunch in a Paris sidewalk bistro and then a languid stroll through the flower market on Ile de Cite in the shadow of the wounded cathedral of Notre Dame. And the art – always the art.

Last stop would be Ireland … a drive around the entire circumference of the island. There is so much to see along the Irish coast. Not only are the vistas varied and breathtaking, but the music – from Dingle to Galway to Dublin – is enchanting and often in intimate, little pubs. Of course, there would be a lengthy stay with my family in County Armagh with a trip to the family farm.

Q: What is the silliest thing you have ever done?
A. Let’s skip this one. Can’t think of anything.

Q: What is the hardest thing you have ever done?
A. Two things … turning down the best newspaper job I had ever been offered to follow what I believed was God’s call on my life … and writing this non-fiction book.