The Guardian by Jeffrey Konvitz

(pb; 1979: sequel to The Sentinel)

From the back cover

“Evil is raging on the twentieth floor of an apartment building on the West Side. In an open window, a hideous blind nun perpetually gazing. . .watching. A body burned beyond recognition. Then two more murders. . .strangely connected. And the discoverer, a beautiful young woman, raped. Her innocent child exposed to horror. Her husband, furious, relentlessly set on revenge. A cool, calculating, laughing priest intent on saving more lives from destruction. And so it begins. . .powerful, satanic, terrifying.”

Review

Possible spoilers in this review.

Guardian is a strange, problematic and disappointing sequel to The Sentinel. Several things mar this ambitious, unwieldy novel.

One of these glaring flaws is the expanded homophobia (initially seen with the slovenly, craven lesbians in Sentinel). While this expressed disgust is reflective of the characters and their Catholicism in both novels, Konvitz lays it on thicker than necessary in Guardian, shoe-horning that outsized hatred into the storyline, even basing one of its key twists on that disgust.

Also, there are too many subplots, red herrings and Satanic cannon fodder characters running around, making Guardian feel like an odd, badly cobbled together tale. Sentinel was a focused, organic work for the most part; Guardian is not.

Not only that, Charles Chazen, revealed to be Satan-with-limited-powers in the first book, now has the abilities of the Almighty: he can strike anyone, anywhere, at any time, whereas in Sentinel he had boundaries─he inflicted influence over and visions onto select people but he could not kill them outright. In Guardian, he can. I write this last criticism bearing in mind that Chazen/Satan has been unbound from the Sentinel’s brownstone. That said, Chazen’s sudden power blossom reads like Konvitz discarded series consistency and opted for plot convenient, Omen-like ubiquitous satanic dread.

This brings me to what I like about Guardian. I appreciate its dark atmosphere, consistent with its source novel. I like that it features some of the characters from the original book, and it shows the process through which the priests sought and psychologically groomed the next Sentinel candidate─it is clear that Konvitz wants to expand the storyline, not merely write a pro forma sequel.

Unfortunately, its flaws outweigh its bleakish joys, and Guardian comes off as a rough draft in need of serious editorial whittling. If you must read it, buy it for cheap or, better yet, borrow it from your local library if you can.

The Sentinel by Jeffrey Konvitz

(hb; 1974: prequel to The Guardian)

From the inside flap

“When Allison Parker found the old brownstone apartment it was to be a new beginning─a place where she cold forge the agony of her father’s illness and death, a place where she could quietly recover from that long ordeal. But slowly a sense of mounting terror began to take over. The neighbors─the old man and his cat, the two strange women, the blind priest─seemed to be something other than what they appeared.

“Then the headaches began. They had plagued her as she watched her father die; now they returned with an intensity that left her numb and shaken, threatening her tenuous grip on reality. And then she realized that here on  this quiet street an epic battle was being waged, a battle ordained from the beginning of time; and she was the prize.”

Review

Sentinel is an excellent, often-unnerving horror novel, with some terrifying images and action, and a pervasive sense of dread throughout its run. Its characters range from religious-iconic shallow and evil to fully realized (especially Christina and her boyfriend, Michael)─most of them work in the story. I write “most” because of the way two next-door lesbians are presented: the outsized horror and derision that is shown toward them may raise the hackles of modern-day LGBT+ supporters (Christina, in general, is horrified by them; Michael dismisses them as “vicious”).

I was initially alarmed at the venom Christina verbally and physically displays towards them (she does not just condemn them for being publicly lascivious, she condemns them for being lesbians). Then I checked myself, remembered Christina─victimized by her family and Catholic─is repressed, so any enthusiastic lustful displays are bound to offend her, especially those expressed by a group that most religions have demonized for thousands of years. Not only that, the 1970s, while progressing women’s rights (up to a point), were a period─like now─when aggressive, necessary feminism was getting a lot of scary, verbal and physical pushback not only from men, but gender-traitorous hausfrau women.

I normally would not give this much “airtime” to an issue that should be dismissed with an understanding of presentism (judge a work by the society and time period that produced it) and its protagonist’s paranoid bias. Unfortunately, a lot of knee-jerk social warriors may not take the time to check their biases while reading this hard-to-set-down, no-words-wasted suspense/horror novel, which may be a milestone for many, including myself, in the 1970s.

This vivid-enough-to be-called-cinematic book is worth owning, if you can get past its dated, egregious attitudinal flaws regarding women and LGBT+ issues. Followed by The Guardian.

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The resulting film was released stateside on January 7, 1977. Michael Winner directed and co-wrote the film. His co-screenwriter was book-source author Jeffrey Konvitz.

Christina Raines played Allison Parker. Chris Sarandon play Michael Lerman. Jeff Goldblum played Jack. Deborah Raffin played Jennifer.

Ava Gardner played Miss Logan. Eli Wallach played Detective Gatz. Christopher Walken played Detective Rizzo. 

Burgess Meredith played Charles Chazen. Sylvia Miles played Gerde. Beverly D’Angelo played Sandra. Kate Harrington played Mrs. Clark.

Martin Balsam played Professor Ruzinsky. Hank Garrett played Brenner. William Hickey played Perry.

Arthur Kennedy played Monsignor Franchino. John Carradine played Father Halliran. José Ferrer played “Robed Figure.” Jerry Orbach played “Film Director.” Tom Berrenger played “Man at end.” Nana Visitor, billed as Nana Tucker, played "Girl at end."