Sign of the Cross

March 19, 2018
This derivative series launch from Cooper (Near Death) features yet another two-fisted academic on the trail of a religious relic with the power to change history. Cal Donovan, a Harvard Divinity School professor of religious history and archeology who’s known in the boxing ring as “The Reaper,” is approached by his Boston friend Cardinal Da Silva with a request from the pope. The pontiff, impressed with Cal’s book Holy Wounds: A History of Stigmata from the Middle Ages to the Present, wants Cal to investigate a current claim that a young Italian priest, Giovanni Berardino, has such wounds on his wrists. Cal travels to Italy, where he examines the priest, who doesn’t appear to be a fraud. Meanwhile, Lambret Schneider, the leader of a neo-Nazi group whose members call themselves the Knights of Longinus, has designs on the Holy Lance, the weapon used by a Roman centurion to stab Jesus, as well as on Berardino. Even Dan Brown devotees are likely to consider this old hat.

May 1, 2018
Cooper, author of the Will Piper and John Camp Down series, introduces a new run of religious-conspiracy thrillers featuring Cal Donovan, Harvard professor of religion and archaeology. After Donovan is summoned to the Vatican to investigate the case of a young priest who has seemingly developed the stigmata of the crucifixion, his inquiry intensifies when Father Giovanni is kidnapped. Donovan and Giovanni's sister, Irene, race against the clock to rescue Gio and unravel a mystery that reaches back to antiquity and involves Nazi treasure hunters and a contemporary political cataclysm. Cooper's intelligent, heart-pounding homage to Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and The Da Vinci Code (2003) will appeal to fans of action, thriller, and conspiracy genres.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)