Vividly imagined in the best-selling tradition of Ira Levin and Thomas Tryon, now comes a breath-taking novel of inspiration and unspeakable terror.. VIRGIN.

The year is 1987, a time centuries removed from the first humble beginnings in Bethlehem, seventy years after the miracle at Fatima when the Blessed Virgin appeared to give a message to mankind. The message was a promise -- and a warning. Now, as prophesied, the signs were beginning: *hoards of snakes invading the hillsides of Mexico's Madre Oriental Mountains *sightings of a massive comet hurtling toward the earth *reports from Newport, Rhode Island, of a young girl, mysteriously pregnant -- and a virgin. These were the first indications, a series of unconnected events, baffling and mysterious, except to one man who recognized them for what they were: omens, clear warning that the Virgin's promise was about to be fulfilled with an event so extraordinary that it threatened to explode the natural order of creation and send it spinning into chaos. The Second Coming was at hand..