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From Publishers Weekly In Gibbins's sequel to Atlantis , marine archeologist Jack Howard searches for an ancient gold menorah seized by Vespasian's army during the sack of Jerusalem. While Jack and his team of scientists and historians follow clues from Istanbul and England to the Arctic, Canada and Mexico, a group of neo-Nazis (who have co-opted an organization as old as the Crusades and dedicated to the relic's safety) conspire to find and use the menorah to destabilize the world's religions. Stilted exposition, in which Jack details large chunks of history for colleagues who should already know it, mars an otherwise interesting backstory, and cardboard characters rouse little sympathy. Elsewhere, an overwhelming surfeit of detail serves at best to drag down the suspense, at worst to cause terminal confusion. Those with an already-strong sense of Roman, barbarian, Viking and English history, as well as those with a sincere desire to learn, will appreciate Gibbins's alternate history of King Harald Hardrada's defeat, if not necessarily the teacherly style or clunky adventure story in which it's couched. (Oct.) Copyright В© Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Product Description From the fall of the Roman Empire to the last days of Nazi power, marine archaeologist Jack Howard and his team of adventurers are hot on the trail of historyвЂTMs most elusive and desired treasure: the lost golden menorah of Jerusalem. And what they discover could change the world forever…. Deep beneath the windswept waters near Istanbul, Jack and his crack team of experts have uncovered a surprising clue to the location of the fabled treasure plundered during the Crusades. Meanwhile, in a dusty cathedral library, someone unearths a long-forgotten medieval map. Together the two discoveries will solve an ancient mystery—and spark a race to stop a present-day conspiracy of staggering proportions. From diving into the core of an arctic iceberg to the last stand of a Viking warship to an extraordinary revelation deep in the jungles of Central America, Jack is headed straight into a globe-spanning clash of civilizations, into an astounding underground labyrinth steeped in blood and horrors—and to a confrontation with a killer on a shattering crusade of his own. From the fall of the Roman Empire to the last days of Nazi power, marine archaeologist Jack Howard and his team of adventurers are hot on the trail of history's most elusive and desired treasure: the lost golden menorah of Jerusalem. And what they discover could change the world forever....Deep beneath the windswept waters near Istanbul, Jack and his crack team of experts have uncovered a surprising clue to the location of the fabled treasure plundered during the Crusades. Meanwhile, in a dusty cathedral library, someone unearths a long-forgotten medieval map. Together the two discoveries will solve an ancient mystery--and spark a race to stop a present-day conspiracy of staggering proportions.From diving into the core of an arctic iceberg to the last stand of a Viking warship to an extraordinary revelation deep in the jungles of Central America, Jack is headed straight into a globe-spanning clash of civilizations, into an astounding underground labyrinth steeped in blood and horrors--and to a confrontation with a killer on a shattering crusade of his own.From the Paperback edition. For centuries, people have speculated about the fabled lost libraries of antiquity. If one were found, what marvels would it contain? Now a fearless team of adventurers is about to unearth that long-hidden secret, and it will lead them to the most astonishing discovery ever made. In the treacherous waters off the rugged Sicilian coast, marine archaeologist Jack Howard and his team of scientific experts and ex-Special Forces commandos make a shocking find while searching for the legendary shipwreck of the apostle Paul. And when a second artifact is uncovered in the ruins of a buried city, Jack is on the verge of a discovery that could shake the world to its foundations: the handwritten words of Jesus Christ himself. As he follows a hunch from the dying confession of an emperor to the burial crypt of a medieval pagan queen, Jack is chasing a conspiracy whose web stretches to the highest levels of international power–and he will have to risk everything to stop the controversial document from falling into the hands of a shadowy brotherhood determined to fulfill their murderous vows.