War of angels
War of the Angels is a fantastic novel by Wolfgang Hohlbein and his wife Heike. It was first published in 1999 by Ueberreuter Verlag.
content
The focus of the plot is Eric, a well-to-do son of a lawyer, whose father is currently campaigning for the post of local mayor. Again and again he is tormented by a nightmare in which he sees a burning cherub standing on the roof of a cathedral. However, he always wakes up before he knows whether the angel will die or win the battle.
Hoping to find out the meaning of these dreams, he seeks advice from an old teacher (Mrs. Wellstadt-Roblinsky) who meets with him - to the mockery of his classmates - in a café. But during this meeting it happens: the café is destroyed by a black angel and Eric's teacher disappears without a trace. Since then Eric has not been let out of sight by the aspiring police officer Breuer and his older and experienced colleague Schollkämper. He receives help from an undreamt-of nature: the angel Chep, who has been Eric's guardian angel since birth.
This event is followed by other supernatural events inexplicable to Eric's mind.
He learns - from Chep - that he is chosen to save the world when the final battle ( Armageddon ) is fought . Without knowing it - or even wanting to - he suddenly finds himself in a battle between good and evil. An often life-threatening undertaking for him. Again and again he is visited by the threatening angel Azazel, who tries either to kill him or to kidnap him. Fortunately, Chep always appears at the right time and can save his life.
After many almost insurmountable obstacles, terrible events (e.g. the disappearance of his parents, a voodoo charm with which his Jamaican housekeeper Andrea wants to protect him, a night in prison, a stay in a mental hospital), he ends up facing the great cathedral from his dream. The time has come: the armies are ready for the final battle. But Armageddon does not take place because Eric outwits his opponents - without knowing it - and the fight does not take place. At the end, Chep opens, who is usually portrayed a bit clumsily in the whole story about who he really is.
Reviews
"An almost ingenious mixture of inventiveness and tension, magic and mysticism." (Nordbayerischer Kurier)
Awards
On November 6, 2007, Hohlbein took second place in the schoolchildren's competition for the opening sentence of this novel (“Der Engel burnnte.”) In a competition organized by the Reading Foundation and the German Language Initiative to find the “ most beautiful first sentence ” .
backgrounds
In “War of the Angels” Hohlbein once again refers to the Bible , to the revelation of John in the New Testament . There it says: