In the powerful new thriller from the author of the international bestseller The Last Templar, a geneticist and a CIA agent on a deadly quest to find the most dangerous book in the world discover a secret that has destroyed everyone in its path for centuries. Naples, 1750. In the dead of night, three men with swords burst into the palazzo of a marquis. Their leader, the Prince of San Severo, accuses the marquis of being an imposter, and demands to know a secret only the marquis harbors. In the fight that ensues, the false marquis escapes over the rooftops of Naples, leaving behind a burning palazzo and a raging prince now obsessed with finding his quarry at any cost. Baghdad, 2003. An army unit on a routine mission makes a horrifying discovery: a state-of-the-art, concealed lab where dozens — men, women, children — have died, the subjects of gruesome experiments. The mysterious scientist they were after, a man believed to be working on a bioweapon and known only as the hakeem — the doctor — escapes, taking with him the startling truth about his work. A puzzling clue is left behind: a circular symbol of a snake feeding on its own tail. As the power of the symbol comes to light, revealing the centuries of destruction left in its wake, one unsuspecting woman stands at the center of a conspiracy that could change the world forever. In the masterful hands of international bestseller Raymond Khoury, The Sanctuary delivers the same rapid-fire suspense and provocative scholarship that made The Last Templar a coast-to-coast blockbuster