City of Secrets: The Extraordinary Story of the Woman Who Found Herself at the Heart of the Grail: The Extraordinary True Story of the Woman Who Found Herself at the Heart of the Grail - Tapa blanda

A poor priest in a rundown parish in the South of France woke up one morning wealthy beyond measure. It was 1891, the parish Rennes le Chateau and Abbe Berenguer Sauniere has mystified the world ever since. In the fifties, a fifteen-year-old girl escapes from her dull, English life to the sun-drenched cobbles of provincial Europe. When she falls in love with an ancient but otherwise unremarkable bourgeois town she falls, too, for its favourite son. Both relationships will last a lifetime. Over the years, the woman returns again and again to the town, and her lover. She meets strange and wonderful people - including Jean Cocteau and Umberto Eco - and hears tales of visions, a phenomenally wealthy priest, a fabulous garden and a beautiful Frenchwoman.The priest is Abbe Sauniere, of Rennes-le-Chateau. Solving the mysteries surrounding his discoveries and sudden wealth have formed the basis of the modern Grail phenomenon - from blockbuster novels and movies to historical analysis and high-profile court cases. Cast as the detective in her own story, and in a series of dramatic twists and turns, the woman finds herself at the heart of a world she barely knew existed. People she has known for over fifty years, members of a secret society set up to protect Abbe Sauniere's legacy, are asking her to act as their messenger. She must take some of their most important secrets, and make them known. This is her story, and their secrets revealed. Rich with photographs, letters and historical documents, it fills in key gaps in one of the most compelling mysteries of all time. It is also a page-turning, true-life adventure set in a beautiful and ancient city, where nothing is as it first appears.

Patrice Chaplin is a novelist, writer and playwright. Her books include Albany Park and Siesta, and have been made into plays and Hollywood films. Part of the Bohemian scene of the fifties and sixties, she now lives in Primrose Hill and runs an addiction charity, The Bridge.