The Fellowship of the Talisman is a curious little Simak novel in which, first, some Dark Evil Forces descended upon mankind, or at least Western Civilization, and kept Western Europe from getting out of its 14th-century funk. It's now 1978, and there's been a precious document discovered --- an apparently authentic journal of Jesus Christ's life. Not a new gospel, merely (merely!) a contemporary account that records the historic Jesus in unprecedented detail, and Simak's band of oddballs have to get it to the university at Oxenford in the hopes of getting it verified.

Since it's a Simak novel some of the group include a mopey ghost, a banshee, and an exiled demon. Also, to spoil things: gur grnz snvyf va gurve zvffvba: juvyr gurl qryvire gur znahfpevcg gur rkcreg jub fubhyq or noyr gb nhguragvpngr vg unf qvrq. Guvf vf npprcgrq fgbvpnyyl: fbzrqnl crbcyr jub pbhyq nafjre gb vgf nhguragvpvgl jvyy or sbhaq, be or genvarq vagb qbvat gur jbex, naq vs gur cebfcrpgf ner tevz abj, gurl jba'g nyjnlf or.