THE VATICAN CHRONICLES SERIES: The Mystery of Julia Episcopa; The Anonymous Scribe; Silent Mistresses

THE MYSTERY OF JULIA EPISCOPA (The Vatican Chronicles #1)
JOHN I. RIGOLI & DIANE CUMMINGS
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Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: In ancient Rome, a woman flees for her life. Her enemies are those she once called 'brother'.

Hidden beneath her blue cloak are secrets men will kill for—forgeries that prove the newly self-appointed bishops are not followers of the way, but pretenders who have seized power and will stop at nothing to shape this new religion to their own ends. Now, Julia—a woman who had once walked with Mary Magdalene and taught alongside Paul must preserve the legacy of the apostles in the face of terrifying danger.

Two thousand years later, classical archaeologists Valentina Vella and Erika Simone are tasked with advising the newly-elected Pope on the historical legacy of women in the early Christian period.

The women stumble across an ancient parchment buried deep in the Vatican archives, a document that has clearly been altered. They find themselves on the trail of a woman who may have been the first woman Bishop in the Catholic faith. To reveal Julia's legacy will put them in the cross-hairs of a venomous Vatican battle for power and supremacy; to stay silent would make them complicit in an ancient heresy and would betray the teachings that Julia sacrificed her life to defend.

The Mystery of Julia Episcopa weaves seamlessly between modern day Rome and the politics of the Catholic church, and the times and life of a 1st century Roman noblewoman who rose to be a dominant force in the early Christian movement.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: I wonder if I'll ever get tired of Vatican-skulduggery stories. I hope not. Archaeology plus ancient history equaling a black eye for one of the greatest forces for evil ever devised by man...christianity as a whole is what I mean...in a present hag-ridden by its rotting zombie corpse never palls.

Two modern archaeologists, Erika and Valentina, discover suppressed evidence of a woman bishop's existence in early christian days. Setting out to discover what they can about her is obviously going to be fraught...the catholic church is hostile to the merest whisper of women in positions of power, triply so in its own hierarchy...and more dangerous than even that baseline because their funding comes from a mustachio-twirling baddie in the form of Cardinal Ricci, a Central Casting Villain of the most amusingly OTT sort.

The generally christian-positive message of Julia Lucinia Aquiliana coming to be Julia Episcopa is tied up with the most famous moment in Roman history: Vesuvius erupting and burying Pompeii in 79CE. It acts as the major, defining moment of the past timeline in the novel, and in the present as the moment these two woman archaeologists understand what they have on their hands: The literal smoking...gun, you should forgive, in the quest to prove women have been calculatedly written out of church history.

This being my own assumption about history more broadly, I'm all invested and on board.

Still and all, this is a literary pleasure for me, and its positive religious overtones put me off.

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THE ANONYMOUS SCRIBE (The Vatican Chronicles #2)
JOHN I. RIGOLI & DIANE CUMMINGS
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Rating: 3* of five

The Publisher Says: When the lie is two thousand years old, who, exactly, will the truth set free?

While analyzing parchment fragments from the Dead Sea Scrolls, grad student Susan Bauer pieces together text that indicates the existence of a stolen Secret Temple Scroll that was penned decades before the gospels. If discovered, this document could free the Jewish people from the centuries’-long blemish that they are responsible for Yeshua’s death.

It could also turn Christianity on its head.

From the basement of the Israeli Museum to a basilica in a picturesque French village to the ruins of Herculaneum, ex-Mossad Yigael Dorian and blacklisted archaeologists Valentina Vella and Erika Simone journey on a transcontinental chase, dodging thieves, kidnappers, cardinals, and enlisting mobsters to uncover the truth behind this rumored scroll.

It is the writer of this document, however, who has the final word in a mesmerizing depiction of life in the Galilee alongside Yeshua.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: I got a lot less invested in the Intrepid Sleuths' archaeological skulduggery when we moved into territory that presumes the figure at the center of the lunatic belief system we call christianity was a living breathing human being.

There exists no shred of evidence of this. Inventing one for this story was a step past my personal suspension-of-disbelief line.

It is a testament to the writing chops of the authorial duo that I was compelled to keep reading, and that I give this story three whole stars. I am mightily opposed to everything this entry in the series is presenting, and irked by the certainty that some will think it's probable it represents some kind of truth. No matter; honesty insists that I rate it on its storytelling merits. Three stars.

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SILENT MISTRESSES (The Vatican Chronicles #3)
JOHN I. RIGOLI & DIANE CUMMINGS with Lisa Cerasoli
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Rating: 3* of five

The Publisher Says: A Vatican Bank cover-up. A devout whistleblower. A Church with everything to lose.

Sister Maria Caruso was sent to the Vatican Bank to modernize its systems—not to unearth secrets worth killing for. But when a €30 million discrepancy leads her to a web of hidden accounts, she stumbles onto something far more dangerous than embezzlement.

The money was only the surface. What it concealed runs far deeper. For decades, powerful men within the Church have used secret funds to protect private sins—names that must never be named, affairs that break more than vows—a history the Vatican is willing to bury—along with anyone who gets too close.

As Maria begins to pull on the thread, she becomes a target. Trapped inside the very institution she once trusted, her only weapon is the technology the Church has long dismissed. Her only choice? Stay silent and survive—or expose the truth and risk everything.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Okay. We're switching gears. No more archaeology, now we're in computer forensics and accountancy.

I quit caring. The Banco Ambrosiano scandal took place in my adulthood and, as I thought then, represented an iceberg's tip of the real story.

While nice enough to read as a mystery, the topic was not what I expected it to be or wanted to read about. The authors, as assisted, turned out a run-of-the-mill crime story with stakes I just could not invest in. Three stars for competency. None for my personal enjoyment.