Meet the Author

J.B. Keats

Physician, naval officer, professor, lecturer, and now author, Keats' lifelong fascinations with science, history, and religion intersect in his compelling prose, including IPPY’s (Independent Publisher's) Silver Medal winner *He Can See Heaven*, and in his forthcoming historical novel, *A Traveler Came By*. Infused with a kaleidoscope of characters and enchanting locales, J.B.’s provocative fiction probes the passions that motivate his distinctive characters and sets them on a canvas of intriguing circumstance, liberating the readers’ fancy and transporting them to places as real as their own.
With a mindset shaped by his remote Allegheny boyhood, modified and refined by decades of academic discipline, J.B. writes what he knows. From baseball and America’s civil rights struggle to the history of the New Testament and from gilded university towers to the stench of crowded locker rooms, his complex and enigmatic personalities are true to the people he’s encountered. The avaricious and noble, selfless and narcissistic, fearful and intrepid come alive, shocking the reader when least expected.

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Recent Works

A Traveler Came By

It’s 1964. Jack Shea is a precocious, bold bookworm and dazzling baseball phenom who heads south in search of a draft-deferring scholarship where he collides with two spellbinding forces: a conflicted Deep South on the brink of epic change and a complex Cajun beauty who kidnaps his heart.

He Can See Heaven

A cascading adventure of discovery, intrigue, and romance, He Can See Heaven tells the tale of Ellen Shea, an intrepid graduate student on a perilous search through exotic locales for a trove of lost scrolls.

The Commander

An engrossing deathbed confession reveals a life lived on the edge.

Reviews

Our author states at the outset that this work, presumably his first, occurs at twilight. I hope not. He Can See Heaven is ablaze with action, intrigue, mystery, history, a dollop of sadness, and crisp, radiant prose. If not a sequel, hopefully Dr Keats will treat us with a second novel equally as entertaining. As to the story, we have all wondered, haven't we, if "the Bible" -- in this case, the New Testament, King James version -- really tells it like it was. Scholars who know of the parallel universe encompassing not only Christianity's but Muslim and Jewish treatment of the story of Jesus of Nazareth will be treated in this historical mosaic to a most compelling account of The Quelle, believed to be not so much the lost scrolls but the deliberately hidden and feared alternative account of much of Jesus' life. The heroine/protagonist is in hot pursuit, but others are as well. Both the spectacle and the sinister side of Granada, Spain serves as the backdrop. Read this book! You will be thoroughly entertained!

Ray Roush
author of All the Angels and Saints

J.B. Keats's He Can See Heaven is a welcome addition to the new literary interest in the hidden origins of Christianity. A modern tale of archaeological quest and discovery, it traces the winding search for the most secret of sacred texts, the Quelle, the original account of Jesus's life and teachings. Told from the point of view of Ellen, a young, present-day scholar, it follows her journey from the libraries of New York through Palestine and Spain to the Quelle's secret hiding place in Granada, where its revelation at tale's end has a revolutionary effect on the truth of Christianity as we know it. Rich in both the details of Ellen's personal and professional adventures, it also includes a panoramic evocation of the vast history of the late Roman Empire and the civilization of ancient Spain. Daunting, absorbing, affecting, it is a debut novel with a difference, learned, skillful, and yet intensely readable.

Perry Meisel
Professor of English
New York University

In his book, Keats certainly shoots for formulaic genre fiction with all the signature elements: a dangerous archaeological quest, amoral competitors in search of a theologically significant prize, and the back story of a corrupt and conspiratorial Roman Catholic Church. Thankfully, Keats works within those stale parameters with considerable verve and charm, and his writing crackles with wry wit. Ellen’s academic mentor, Monsignor Brahaney, acerbically describes the professor: “Well, Parkinson was beyond ruthless, damn close to sociopathic, less interested in the research than what it brought him. Think Cromwell, Ellen, in tweed.” The author’s research is also extraordinarily deep and raises provocative questions about the meaning of Christianity independent of its institutional incarnation. Finally, Ellen turns out to be a companionable guide through the tale, both razor sharp and full of spunk. Anyone drawn to the genre can only hope a sequel adventure reprises the character.

An entertaining and thoughtful race to find a historical gem and a potentially world-changing truth.

Kirkus Reviews

Keats masterfully weaves the record of early Christianity into this fast story of intrigue, suspense, and romance, bringing alive the key players of the early church and raising the timeless issues of belief and unbelief as the tale unfolds. The discovery of new and valid scriptures is imagined as not before, creating existential crises in his characters and leading the reader to imagine a new Christian world.