The Templar Legacy: A Novel

I bought this on a whim - I've heard some good things about Berry and I have to say, his writing style did not disappoint. And yes, it's entirely fair to say this is, er, "inspired" by Dan Brown.But I think it goes a little far to call it an outright knockoff. Cotton Malone makes for an intriguing protagonist, and the story moves along within his characterization. By that I mean I don't have to suspend a whole lot of disbelief to accept startling leaps of insight and intuition from the characters.The story itself is, well, I'm not sure it matters. I mean, the plot for thrillers doesn't have to be documentary-quality. Suffice it to say that facts cited aren't inaccurate, the story itself is plausible and works with its own internal logic, and it's not something that makes me roll my eyes. There are certain sequences in the book that had me turning pages...well, pressing the Next Page button on my Kindle anyway.In short, it's an enjoyable read...a good overview of history to make it accessible to the interested lay reader, enough facts to keep it interesting for those who know more about the history in question, and Berry does interesting things with it all to turn it into a work of fiction. It's a good book.

Interesting and very detailed plot. Premise revealed at end of book is that Christ was not resurrected, so the basis of Christianity is a lie. It's an interesting plot with varied twists and turns to get there, but I suspect that for true Christians, this will make them feel they wasted their time reading the book. For non-Christians, however, this will reinforce their belief that Christians are all fools to believe what they do. I can't recommend the book.

A fun read in much the same vain as the Da Vinci Code and an Indiana Jones movie. At the end of the book Berry describes what was fact, what was fiction and what was gray area between the two.My only quibble is that he sometimes frames what is fairly commonly known Biblical history and tries to make it sound like scholarly knowledge known only to a few. But, then again, he wrote this for mass consumption and most people probably would not know those common facts.Overall a fun read combining the Knights Templar, a smattering of alternative theology and a spy novel.

This author puts the story up front, as real feeling as it gets. Your going to love this. Easy read, fast paced, with great characters that almost grab you by the hand and drag you along for the greatest adventure imaginable. If edge of your seat adventure is on your list then beside it will be this book. All the way to the end you are going to be part of each thrill and move the characters make. This author put his all into making this story one of the very best ever written about the Templars. The only one thing I didn't like, characters names. Give everybody simple names, I don't want my mind pronouncing some of these names, it slows me down. So, get your glasses, and don't miss a single word. Enjoy.

'Nuff said. Far too "Dan Brown-ish" with anti-theological assumptions that are beyond ignorant and have been proved false repeatedly. This could have been so much better.

I have started my adventure with Cotton Malone and it was a thrilling and wild ride. I mean right from the get go we were thrown into some heavy action with little knowledge of why. We are however introduced to our lead character of Cotton Malone, but this story is not just told from his perspective. It is actually told from a few others as well, including the main villain, a character know as the Seneschal, and sometimes from Cotton's former boss Stephanie Nelle.So Cotton formerly worked for the Justice Department until one incident pushes him into an early retirement. The story itself picks up a year after that where Cotton lives in Copenhagen as a sort of Book Antiquer. One day he gets a call from his former boss Stephanie that she will be in the area and it takes off from there. Cotton was a really great character to follow from. I'm intrigued by his overall persona and want to get to know more about him. Stephanie was an okay character, I liked her but she definitely could have been fleshed out a little more. This book really focuses a lot about her past but I was more intrigued by everything else going on. The character that hit me the most was actually the villain of the story. His drive, his tenacity, the lines he was willing to cross were executed very very well. Especially with this book focusing a lot on the Templar's and of course the truth behind them.The Templar Legacy did a fantastic job with the overall mystery and really keeping the reader on the edge. I know I was for pretty much the entirety of the book. I think the one thing I had a tad issue with was near the 75% mark the story and mystery became very info dumpy which I totally understood but it was at times quite repetitive. There was also a reveal in the book towards the end that I didn't particularly feel was necessary but it was minor.I overall thoroughly enjoyed this book and I cannot wait to read more of Cotton Malone's stories.

I have read several of the Cotton Malone Series, obviously out of order. This is by far the weakest. The plot is not bad but the Author bites off much more than he can chew with the multiple twists that bog down rather than promote the story line. His limited understanding of history, Textual criticism, and archeology as it relates to ancient texts is too distracting for the advanced story line. This one was a swing and a miss for me.

I enjoy Steve Berry’s books and have read most of them. So I decided to read “The Templar Legacy” again after having read it several years ago. Berry does a lot of historical research for his books which he weaves throughout his edge-of-your-seat novels. His descriptions of the settings and actions makes you feel like you’re right there participating in the events. My only complaint with “Templar” is that, toward the end, I became confused by all the characters and action and details of the story; I’ll blame it on my getting older. Otherwise, a good read, and you’ll learn a lot of history about the Templars.

This book is drivel. Well-written drivel, with good character development, but drivel all the same.The setting and plot plagiarise the content of "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail" by Lincoln & Baigent even more closely than "The Da Vinci Code" does, but the author tries to go a step further in "solving" the wholly invented "riddles" contained therein by adding an extra layer of linguistic complexity - and fails dismally because his grasp of Latin is so poor.Everything hinges on the word for the first-person pronoun "I" being the same in English and Latin, which it patently isn't. (This error is all the more embarrassing because the actual Latin word for "I" - i.e. "Ego" - appears in an earlier part of the riddle being described.) The other vital clue involves translating the Latin phrase "Prae cum" as "Pray to come", which is childishly nonsensical. (The Latin word "precum" does mean prayer, but the rendering provided by the author cannot exist grammatically.)Mind you, the author also uses "mélange" when he means "mêlée" (to described a confused struggle involving a number of people) on several occasions, so it is not only in Latin where he falls down.More generally, the book is yet another tedious re-hashing of the hidden "truth" behind the Christian Gospels: namely that Jesus did not rise from the dead, was not the son of God, and Christianity was an entirely man-made enterprise.Of course, anyone is free to believe these stories or not, but the author parrots the conspiracist view that the four established Gospels contained within the New Testament are obviously and automatically untrue, and other "gospels" that have allegedly been discovered (Gospels of Thomas, John, Mary Magdalene etc.) are obviously and automatically true - when in fact, there is no real evidence of a historical basis for any Biblical writings.Granted, he admits that he invented the "Gospel of Peter" that he uses to suggest that Christianity was based on the concept of Christ living on in the minds of his followers rather than being physically resurrected - but the extremely heavily underlined sub-text is that this is what actually happened in reality in any case.Likewise, the author describes the Knights Templar as Gnostics, which is utterly untrue: the Templars were sworn enemies of the Gnostic heresy, and were Roman Catholics through and through. He even appears to hint that the Papacy, as the temporal representative of the Catholic Church, fomented the Albigensian heresy, which is ridiculous, as again, Roman Catholics including the Templars dedicated themselves to destroying it.All in all, Mr. Berry is a very good story-teller - but he does himself no favours by banging the drum of this terribly cliched subject in exactly the same way as so many have done before him.

The Templar LegacyOccasionally you come across an excellent book by complete chance. I had never heard of Steve Berry never mind any of his books. An error with the Kindle and I ended up with Berry’s book. It turned out to be one mistake that had a positive outcome.Cotton Malone is a retired American Intelligence agent. He has settled in Copenhagen where he has opened a bookshop. Meeting his former boss for lunch his hope for a relaxed social event is dashed as a mugging and a violent death take place right in front of him.At the heart of the matter are the Templars an organisation believed to have been wiped out in the fourteenth century. This is not the case though and the Templars are about to come out from the shadows to claim their heritage and right the wrongs done to them.Berry’s knowledge of the Templars comes through in practically every page. He links well both the factual content and the fictional interpretation. This results in an excellent and compelling story which may also cause the reader to question some fundamental beliefs of their own.I started this review by highlighting the fact that getting this book was an error. In addition I also said I had been unaware previously about the author. In the end I ended up thoroughly enjoying it and before long I intend having a look at some of Steve Berry’s other publications.Great book.

I realty enjoyed the end of this book, because meant I did not have to read any more. Unfortunately I bought on a deal of the day, and read three chapters and thought I stumbled on an other Ben Hope series and bought quite a few more that were on offer.There were three lines of plotting shortly afterwards, heck of a lot of inconsequential chit chat talking about the past and things biblical at every opportunity.Templar's that are suppose to be monastic seem to have guns on hand and are up for a bit of old fashion torture.With an ending that's a cross between National Treasure and Indiana Jones.Two star rating as I did not give up on it, but boy was I sorely tempted.It could have done with a bit of editing it down. Some authors I feel cheated that write 4 to 5 page chapters finishing a page on a few sentences and the stat the next way down the next page. This have very long chapters and when I saw the very long chapters I wish it had been the former, with the number of pages in the book. So rather a waste of paper this was a waste of my time.If you find this book similar to my experience, and prefer something with a bit of get up and go with only a smattering of history involved, try Scott Mariani's, Ben Hope series.

Next to Charles Dickens, this is the most boring book I have ever half read. I gave up at 51%!Firstly there is far too much religion. Secondly it is set in France with French names and a complex array of settings. I cannot keep up with foreign names of which I cannot form an image. Thirdly, some of it is set in Medieval times and some is modern. Which is which is, at times, difficult to discern. Fourthly it gives the impression that the bits about the Templars is fact whist actually nobody really knows anything about them. Lastly if this is "An explosive thriller" i hate to think what other thrillers are like. The amount of action in the first half was minimal and what there was could only be described as "tame". I have no idea what sort of "agent" the hero was but as he retired to run a second hand book shop I think that tells you all you need to know.If you suffer from insomnia - read this book. All will be cured!!!!

I've been intrigued by the Rennes-le-Chateau story ever since I saw Henry Lincoln's Chronicle programme on the subject so I'm always interested to see what new insights/twists writers can add to an already twisted story.This is the first Steve Berry book I've read and it turns out to be a pretty straightforward thriller, not quite so hectically paced as Dan Brown's, but moving along at a reasonable speed.Unfortunately, for me, there were no surprises or revelations. The "major twist midway through the story" was guessed several chapters before it happened. The text of the Gospel of Simon was a reasoned surmise, but I felt too sophisticated for a poor fisherman of that era to come up with.I'm not fully aware of Cotton Malone's background as I haven't read any of the other books featuring him, but I thought he was far too slow in picking up on the electronic car tag; this should have happened much earlier in the book. Also apart from the deciphering of the codexes, nothing was made of the fact that, although said to be the same, they were in fact different.I kept stumbling over the Great Devise as well; the phrase didn't really mean anything to me. I wondered if it was a spelling mistake and he meant device. It didn't become any clearer when the treasure and the "treasure" was found so I still don't know what he meant by this. And, as is usual for so many who tackle the Rennes/Jesus story, the cop-out of simply hiding the discovery away from the world. For myself, I would have found it much more interesting if there had been more on the Templars re-emerging from their self-imposed exile and telling the world what they had found. That would really have been a thriller.