Westlake, Donald E - Novel 51

           
Humans
is a jumbo sized fantasy thriller
featuring angels, demons, all-too human humans, and nothing less than the
complete destruction
of
planet Earth!

           
The world stinks. God is fed up.
He’s ready to take action.

           
He’s done it once before, you know.
Whipped up a big flood and wiped out the human race—-not to mention the lions
and lambs and lobsters and cockroaches. But this time, He’s not preserving any
samples. This time, it’s for keeps.

           
One of His very best Angels has been
given the contract. He’s sent to round up a disparate crew of human beings from
every corner of the world—a Soviet joke-writer, a Kenyan prostitute, a
Brazilian ex-superstar chanteuse, a Chinese student-dissident, and a career
criminal from Omaha, among them—gently manipulate them into a rendezvous, and
set the wheels rolling for them to bring about the End of the World as We Know
It.

           
Not an easy job, but you don’t get
to be an Angel without learning a few dirty tricks.

           
But—there’s Somebody who happens to
like
what the human race has been doing
with the planet. And soon our Angel finds himself challenged by a very wily
Demon—dispatched by the Arch-fiend himself—whose mission is to
save
the world.

           
Deciding whom to root for is only
one of the pleasures afforded by Donald E. Westlake’s brilliant new novel.

           
NOVELS

           
Humans
· Sacred Monster · A Likely Story
Kahawa · Brothers Keepers · I Gave at the Office
Adios, Scheherazade · Up Your Banners

           
COMIC CRIME NOVELS

           
Trust
Me on This ·
High
Adventure
Castle
in the Air · Enough · Dancing Aztecs
Two Much ·
Help
I Am Being Held
Prisoner
Cops and Robbers · Somebody Owes Me Money
Who Stole Sassi Manoon? · God Save the Mark
The Spy in the Ointment · The Busy Body
The Fugitive Pigeon

           
THE DORTMUNDER SERIES
Drowned Hopes · Good Behavior
Why Me · Nobody’s Perfect
Jimmy the Kid · Bank Shot · The Hot Rock

           
CRIME NOVELS

           
Pity
Him Afterwards · Killy · 361
Killing Time · The Mercenaries

           
JUVENILE

           
Philip

           
WESTERN

           
Gangway
(with Brian Garfield)

           
REPORTAGE

           
Under
an English Heaven
SHORT STORIES

           
Tomorrow’s
Crimes · Levine

           
The
Curious Facts Preceeding My Execution and Other Fictions

           
ANTHOLOGY

           
Once
Against the Law (edited by William Tenn)

           
THE MYSTERIOUS PRESS
New York
·
Tokyo
·
Sweden
·
Milan

           
Published
by Warner Books

           
O
A Time Warner Company

           
Copyright
© 1992 by Donald E. Westlake All rights reserved.

           
Mysterious Press books are published
by

           
Warner Books, Inc., 1271 Avenue of
the
Americas
,
New York
,
NY
10020
. Q A Time Warner Company

           
The Mysterious Press name and logo
are trademarks of Warner Books, Inc. Printed in the
United States of America

           
First printing: February 1992

           
10 98765432 1

           
Library of Congress Cataloging in
Publication Data

           
Westlake, Donald E.

           
Humans / Donald E. Westlake, p. cm.

           
ISBN
0-89296-468-5
I.
Title.

           
PS3573.E9H78 1992 813'.54—dc20

           
PROTEST

           
The science in this novel is as
accurate as I can make it.

           
The theology in this novel is as
biblically correct as I can make it.

           
As for the rest, it is a novel. All
the humans in it are of my invention.

           
The angel... well... I believe I
made him up.

           
DEDICATION

           
One day in 1986, in Taormina,
Sicily, Evan Hunter told me I should think about doing a book in some way
different from what I’d done before; larger in scope, perhaps, or new in
approach, or unexpected in thematic material. If Evan hadn’t put that bee in my
bonnet, this book would not exist.

           
On a later day, in 1990, in
New York City
, I found that my voyage into this unknown
had led to an apparent impasse; I could not for the life of me figure out how
to go on. Several desperate phone calls later I met, via fax, a gentleman,
scholar, physicist, and science-fiction writer in
California
named Robert Forward. We communicated over
several days in a flurry of faxes, before he finally transmitted, “By George! I
do believe he’s
got
it!” Without him,
this book would never have been finished.

           
On every day, in every way,
everywhere, my wife, Abby Adams, makes it possible and keeps me from carelessness
and error. Without her, this book would not be coherent.

           
Evan, Bob, Abby: it’s
your
fault.