Key to the Sacred Pattern : The Untold Story of Rennes-le-Chateau

Rating:
Summary: A beautiful second part
Review: 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.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: 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).

Rating:
Summary: Nothing really new here ....
Review: 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.