The Last Templar

Author: Raymond Khoury
Published: January 19, 2006 (Dutton)
Category: General Fiction
Quote of Choice: "A sure sign of a lunatic is that sooner or later, he brings up the Templars."

This is the first book in my serious turn in reading. By serious, I mean that I'm not reading chick lit or regency romance. The story was quite riveting, flipping back and forth from modern day New York to 700 years in the past, with the last Templar knights. It begins with a group of 4 men dressed as Templar knights charging into an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, killing visitors, and grabbing various pieces. One of these pieces holds the key to discovering the long lost secret of the Templars.

The Templars were a mysterious organization and most people think that their secret was the Holy Grail. In The Last Templar, the big secret isn't the Grail, but something that could change the world, mainly, it's the writings of Jesus. Tess Chaykin, an archaeologist known solely for being the daughter of a famous archaeologist, wants to make this huge discovery and make a name for herself. She and the FBI agent Sean Reilly are pulled into this struggle between modern day sensibilities and the old world sensibilities of the Vatican in her quest for the writings. I had hints of Indiana Jones while I was reading.

I'm thinking that if I were religious, I wouldn't like this book, but it brought up some pretty good points about the Christian, Jewish, and Muslim religions. There's so little we know about that time and I always did wonder who wrote the Bible. The ideas in the book have as much chance of being true as everything in the Bible.

Overall, it was a pretty good story, but I don't think I'd keep it on my bookshelf to read again.