Olsen, Mark Andrew

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Olsen, Mark Andrew

PERSONAL: Married; wife's name Connie; children: three Education: Graduate of Baylor University.

ADDRESSES: Home—Colorado Springs, CO. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Bethany House, 11400 Hampshire Ave. S., Minneapolis MN 55438.

CAREER: Writer, novelist, and screenwriter.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

The Assignment, Bethany House (Minneapolis, MN), 2004.

(With Tommy Tenney) Hadassah: One Night with the King, Bethany House (Minneapolis, MN), 2004.

(With Tommy Tenney) Hadassah: The Girl Who Became Queen Esther, Bethany House (Minneapolis, MN), 2004.

(With Tommy Tenney) The Hadassah Covenant, Bethany House (Minneapolis, MN), 2005.

The Watchers, Bethany House (Minneapolis, MN), 2005.

SIDELIGHTS: In his first solo novel, The Assignment, Mark Andrew Olsen presents a spiritual thriller featuring a secret Catholic Church society called the Order of St. Lazare. The order's purpose is to find the "Restrainer," a person believed to have been alive since the time of Christ and who has the Divine task of holding off evil until a new age begins. When Father Stephen joins the Order of St. Lazare, he becomes involved in the hunt and, with other members of the order, traces the man to a tomb buried at Birkenau, the Polish concentration camp from World War II. However, an incarnation of Satan called the "Destroyer." is trying to thwart their efforts to reach him. Tamara Butler, writing in the Library Journal, commented that the "multifaceted plot of good and evil is a page-turner." A Publishers Weekly contributor noted that the author "knows how to raise the occasional goose bump."

Olsen has also collaborated with writer Tommy Tenney on a series of novels beginning with Hadassah: One Night with the King. The story revolves around a woman named Hadassah who is given a letter from the ancient queen of Persia, Esther. The letter has supposedly been passed down through generations of Ha-dassah's family and reveals Esther's life and times in detail. A Publishers Weekly contributor commented that "the authors reinvigorate an age-old story." The reviewer went on to note that the book has "a few surprise twists."