THE SURROGATE: BOOK ONE
In a remote corner of the Cathedral of Oviedo in Spain, Father Miguel Alvarez is in charge of taking care of the most holy relic of all Christendom: the sudarium, the towel-sized cloth which covered the face of Christ immediately following his death. At eighty years of age, behind the heavy grated door to the Camara Santa (the Holy Chamber), he prays fervently before the relic. Suddenly, a pair of hands grips his head, forcing him to breathe a moistened cloth that causes him to lose consciousness. Not, however, before he sees a masked figure with a scalpel in his hand leaning over the holy bloodstained sudarium. Seven years later, in Fall River, Massachusetts, Hannah Manning, a 19 year-old waitress, is waiting for a sign - something that will tell her what she is supposed to be doing with her life. One day, she notices an advertisement in the newspaper looking for surrogate mothers. The emptiness in Hannah's life suddenly subsides; she seems to have found something meaningful to do with herself. Instead of finding fulfillment as a surrogate mother, however, Hannah ends up taking a terrifying journey deep into a land of fanaticism and zealotry.
 

"Little by little, Foglia and Richards reveal the strands that make up the conspiracy. For that, they succeed in joining the latest developments in genetic experimentation with the moral and religious implications that arise from such an undertaking. A great deal of what they imagine could already be carried out in our times, while other things could easily be a reality in the near future. 

'The Sudarium' is a story that keeps the reader on the edge of his seat, even when he has turned the final page, because if some questions are answered in the course of the book, others continue to stick in the mind of whoever picks up this disturbing work." - LA REFORMA (MEXICO)
 

An international bestseller already published in Spain, Mexico, Brazil, Poland and Russia.

Leonard Foglia and David Richards have co-authored five novels, The Sudarium Trilogy: The Surrogate, The Son and The Savior, Face Down in the Park and 1 Ragged Ridge Road. Mr. Richards is also the author of Played out: The Jean Seberg Story and Mr. Foglia has directed many distinguished Broadway plays and operas. You can learn more about the authors on their website http://www.thesudarium.com/