Ian Caldwell Books

Ian Caldwell returns with a new intellectual thriller that confirms his place among the most ambitious popular storytellers working today, as a lost gospel, a relic, and a dying pope's final wish send two brothers - both Vatican priests - on a quest to untangle Christianity's biggest mystery. 2004. As Pope John Paul II's reign enters its twilight, a mysterious exhibit is under construction at the Vatican Museums. A week before it is scheduled to open, its curator is murdered. The same night, a violent break-in rocks the home of the curator's research partner, Father Alex Andreou, a Greek Catholic priest who lives inside the Vatican with his five-year-old son. When the papal police fail to identify a suspect in either crime, Father Alex, desperate to keep his family safe, undertakes his own investigation. To find the killer he must reconstruct the dead curator's secret. But just as he begins to understand the truth about his friend's death, and its consequences for the future of the world's two largest Christian Churches, Father Alex finds himself hunted down ...

It's Easter at Princeton. Seniors are scrambling to finish their theses. And two students, Tom Sullivan and Paul Harris, are a hair's breadth from solving the mysteries of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili--a renowned text attributed to an Italian nobleman, a work that has baffled scholars since its publication in 1499. For Tom, their research has been a link to his family's past--and an obstacle to the woman he loves. For Paul, it has become an obsession, the very reason for living. But as their deadline looms, research has stalled--until a long-lost diary surfaces with a vital clue. And when a fellow researcher is murdered just hours later, Tom and Paul realize that they are not the first to glimpse the Hypnerotomachia 's secrets. Suddenly the stakes are raised, and as the two friends sift through the codes and riddles at the heart of the text, they are beginning to see the manuscript in a new light--not simply as a story of faith, eroticism and pedantry, but as a bizarre, coded mathematical maze. And as they come closer and closer to deciphering the final puzzle of a book that has shattered careers, friendships and families, they know that their own lives are in mortal danger. Because at least one person has been killed for knowing too much. And they know even more.

She opens her mouth to scream, but no sound comes out. She clutches at her throat as thick foam flows from her mouth. Her eyes go wide, and she falls to the floor. "Bertha's been murdered, or more correctly, assassinated." With a secret desire to become President of the United States, Senator Ralf Mudbottom calls an emergency meeting of the National Democrat Party's Election Committee, but the evening doesn't quite go to plan. A serial killer is on the loose and as the race for the White House heats up, the murders increase - killing off key people from each campaign. No one is safe. Brothers, Lewis and Shelton Ledbetter, work together to find the killer which proves more difficult than they could have ever imagined. A plot full of twists and intrigue which will keep you guessing right to the last page.

Un livre peut-il être mortel ? Il y a 500 ans, des personnes ont péri en tentant de déchiffrer l'Hypnerotomania Poliphili. Aujourd'hui, quatre étudiants de Princeton sont captivés par ce texte mystérieux de la Renaissance, qui renferme un secret dangereux. Des meurtres surviennent sur le campus.

Aan de vooravond van hun afstuderen staan twee goede vrienden, Paul Harris en Tom Sullivan, op het punt het mysterie van de codex Hypnerotomachia Poliphili te ontrafelen. Dit oude Venetiaanse manuscript van Francesco Colonna, dat wetenschappers al eeuwenlang voor raadselen plaatst, beschrijft op zeer wonderbaarlijke wijze een liefdesgeschiedenis. Paul en Tom vermoeden dat er een verborgen boodschap achter schuilgaat. Voor ze de kans krijgen die boodschap te ontdekken, worden Paul en Tom en hun vrienden Charlie en Gil bedreigd. Zelfs voor moord deinzen hun tegenstanders niet terug. Als het viertal ontdekt dat het geheim met de Reformatie en verborgen kunstschatten te maken heeft, blijkt het echte onderzoek nog te moeten beginnen...