2012: Deadly Awakening

A mystery novel set in Merida and Chichen Itza Yucatan around the crucial date of December 21, 2012. The scene in Merida is chaotic and tense. People think that the world is about to end, as it is the end of the Maya long-count calendar. Other people think humanity will evolve to a higher form of consciousness. You wouldn't think these are ideals people would kill to protect, but they do. Thousands of spiritual tourists have descended upon this once-peaceful city, creating chaos. People die, and die very badly. New York investigator Miriam Glass teams up with Yucatecan police chief JL Contreras to solve the dramatic murders. Other characters include William, a shady American expat who lives in a Maya Village, Contreras and his two assistants, all earnest policemen bowled over by the behavior of the spiritual visitors, Martin, who has come to Yucatan to experience the death he so richly deserves, the medical examiner Dr. Poot who calls cadavers "people" and Miriam's friend Patty, a taciturn American nurse. Leaders of the spiritual groups include Adam Lionheart, of the Pyrolites of Faith, a huge group of doomsdayers who dress in black and use meth, and Dr. Abyssinia Schlossman, queen of the Children of Kukulcan, a peaceful group of people who hope that humanity is about to evolve to a higher consciousness. The story is set in and around Merida, a lovely five-hundred-year-old colonial city populated by a million souls, eighty-five percent of whom are Maya.

Beryl Gorbman is a writer and private investigator who lives in Seattle WA and Merida Yucatan Mexico.