In a lot of ways this book is really Henry Lincoln responding to the BBC2 television programme "History of a Mystery" which did much to disprove not only his own book ("Holy Blood, Holy Grail") but the derivative work "Tomb of God." This is also Lincoln's way to distance himself (only slightly, however) from the Priory of Sion story (which has very much been proven to be a hoax) and stick more with the geometry aspects of the story (which were really investigated first by David Wood in 1985).

This book is basically just Henry Lincoln setting down the events of his creation of the BBC "Chronicle" programs in the 1970s that opened up the alleged mystery of Rennes-le-Chateau to the European community. He wants to show the path he took to allow people to see that he was not "duped" as he has often been accused of and that the path he followed was logical. To a certain extent, it probably was logical. However, what Lincoln fails to acknowledge in this book (and all his other books) is that Jean Luc-Chaumeil, who does get mention in "Sacred Pattern," basically "ratted out" Pierre Plantard and the alleged Priory of Sion. Chaumeil's work has shown that the Priory was nothing more than a hoax that was started up by Pierre Plantard, who really was in a group of the same name that was started in 1956 by Andre Bonhomme. Thus, Lincoln was "duped." As was Gerard de Sede before him. He fell for the hoax, realized it, and then tried to latch on to another element of the "mystery" that seemed to have more promise and did not involve a "secret society." Lincoln also never mentions the massive contributions to the "mystery" by Jacques Riviere, Pierre Jarnac, and Rene Descadeillas. (He does briefly mention Descadeillas but then dismisses him without any explanation.) He also does not mention that he was presented with evidence from Jean Luc-Chaumeil before the publication of "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" that showed the Priory of Sion was a hoax and that he ignored. Lincoln, in his more recent research, has only concentrated on the alleged geometric aspects of the so-called mystery and he has given up trying to promote the Priory of Sion. That is basically what this book is about: setting up his new element of mystery, the alleged odd geometry. (He also did this because his 1991 "The Holy Place" is largely out of print and thus many of his fans were not aware of the extent of his work in this regard.

All in all, this is a relatively okay book if you want to try to get a very chronological fashion of how certain events happened during the course of the research, which is important to determine the veracity of an independent researcher like Lincoln. However, there is absolutely nothing new in this book that you could not read in "The Holy Place" or in the books that were co-authored with Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh. I would definitely not recommend this book unless you feel you just have to read everything on the story or you feel you need a "blow-by-blow" account, as it were, of Lincoln's research pattern.

I thought the book was "oversold" in a way. From reading the jacket it looked like the "answer" to the Berenger Sauniere mystery, to what on earth it was that turned this impoverished rural cure into a wealthy identity. Now, yes, I know we have the sacred geometry, but it's unfinished? Where's the follow-up on the trough near the grove of trees? Where's the follow-up on just what may have actually happened at the focal point of that pentagram? We don't see it. While the anecdotes are interesting, and tragi-comic in some cases, they almost appear out of place? In some parts I felt like I was reading "The Making of Holy Blood, Holy Grail"" (which I loved by the way).

After reading Andrews and Schellenberger's "The Tomb of God", Lincoln's books seems a little uncomplete. The author's merit is, without any doubt, to have risen the big question about Rennes le Château, with a series of documentaries and books.
After "The Holy Place", Lincoln embarks on a new adventure, recalling other interesting particulars which take the target out of Rennes le Château, leading the reader to North Europe and to Fibonacci and the Templars.
A little too much critic towards Andrews and Schellenberger (who, on their side, have the merit to provide useful information and to suggest further readings), in the first part Lincoln sounds a little too jealous of his own theories and unwilling to listen to other people's point of view. A little too fiction, so to speak. The only reference to "The Tomb of God" (which is not mentioned in the bibliography, indeed very small and not helpful)is really arrogant.
At any rate, the second part of this book is absolutely a must, something able to drag you attention to other interesting, fascinating aspect of human history.
recommended to those who think Rennes le Château is only one ring of the chain.

This was a book I really liked. I found it facinating to read about another two members of the Tudor family. Maybe the most interesting thing about the Tudor family is how they managed to rule, or simply survive, in a time when cruelty, power struggles and dominance over women were common.

In this book Maria Perry tells us about the sisters' childhood and family background, as well as about their adult lives. In both cases the sisters had to marry a king as part of their father's attempt to keep or make allies, and not for love.

The eldest sister Margaret soon ended up as my favourite. She came across as a strong and couragious woman. In a time when women had no power, she fought to take control over her own life. When she was widowed and still pregnant, her brother tried to arrange a wedding for her. But Margaret wanted to marry based on her own choice, something her brother Henry VIII disliked. Later on she had to fight in order to keep her children, since they as heirs to the throne could be used as tools to rule the country by scroupulous men.

--Because this book, for the most part, except when the author decides to basically abandon a person or issue in it, is loaded with details. If you are interested in the life and times of Henry VIII, his relatives, friends and enemies, then you will likely forgive the author's apologist attitudes toward him (and her seemingly hyper-critical eye, in my view, of his sisters). If you are relatively thick-skinned about writers who do that, weaving their own opinions through the story they are telling, while supposedly presenting historical fact, you will find this book very interesting and fairly absorbing. There are a lot of minute details about banquets, clothes and social behavior, which are a lot of fun to read and know about, again, if you're interested in the first place. Which I am, so I liked this book.

Perry writes about the lesser known subject of Henry VIII's two sisters, Margaret and Mary who became Queen of Scotland and Queen of France respectively. It's really a review of his whole family, which shows that his sisters, even as political pawns were much more involved in events than wife focused biographies and legends would generally show. There is some early discussion of their parents, Henry VII and his Queen, Elizabeth of York, which shows how they inherited the royal propensity for pagentry and how, Perry's descriptions are sumptuous, the emphasis on sartorial wealth and jewels was really the political rhetoric of the day. More than that, it seems also have been a business, and many conflicts and wars can be explained by the need for the Tudors to pay for all their nice clothes and jewels--even, or especially, they owed money--so that they can keep being royals. Perry is as assiduous about the financial details as she is avid about the fashion details, and even if you aren't quite sure what the numbers mean the story is always readable, imaginative and intriguing, leaving its share of Historical what-ifs. (What if Mary's long-term youthful betrothal to Charles V of Spain had been honored, for example?) As one might expect Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn get their fair share of mention, but the context of their tribulations seems at once more mundane and more majestic.

This book tells the very neglected story of how decent Germans in a small town reacted to the attacks on their Jewish neighbors on a case study basis. It is often forgotten that between the start of World War Two and their deportations to Poland, Jews still trapped in Germany led an increasingly impossible existence. By restricting Jews'transportation, food rations, money and shopping access, Nazi policy would have starved Jews quickly, had not some Gentiles made it their job to help. This is the first study that documents how elderly Jews relied heavily on neighbors, shopkeepers and officials who gave them extra food, shopped for them or tried to shield them from abuse. The author, unfortunately, chooses to take a pollyannish view of this small town. Obviously the fact that the Jews are eventually all deported and killed should be balanced in this book. Moreover, the author relies overmuch on the helpers' own postwar testimony, and really picks out only a small handful of real helpers. However, the gist of this defense is backed up in other diaries and histories-- eg. "I Will Bear Witness" by Klemperer, "Days of Sorrow and Pain" and "Lost In a Labyrinth of Red Tape." As one reviewer has stated, these testimonies should temper the "nation-of-beasts" thrust of Goldhagen and other Holocaust historians.

This is a very early work of H.C. Carey and perhaps his worst. He cites England and its private central bank as good institutions--a judgment he was shortly, and permanently, to change--as when he labelled England's economico-financial system "the most inimicable to human happiness that has ever been devised." Readers are better off beginning with almost any other Carey book--the Principle of Political Economy, if one has the background and time to spend on these tomes.