Novel
with Violette Cabesos
Albin Michel, 2004
Press houses award 2004
Translated into 13 languages
Presentation
Under the crypt of Mont Saint Michel, a thousand-year-old secret...
Rock beaten by storms, place of primitive worship sanctified by the first Christians, Mont Saint Michel is far from having revealed all its secrets.
At the beginning of the 11th century, the builders of the cathedrals erected a large Romanesque abbey in honor of the Archangel, prince of the celestial armies and conductor of souls in the beyond. A thousand years later, a young archaeologist passionate about the Middle Ages finds herself trapped in an enigma where the past and the present strangely meet.
Translations
German : PIPER R. GMBH & CO.
KG US English : PEGASUS BOOKS (“The Angel's Promise”)
Chinese : SHANGAI 99 READERS' CULTURAL CO LTD.
Korean : YEDAM
Spanish (Castilian): EDICIONES GRIJALBO
Modern Greek (after 1453): ELECTRA EDITIONS
Lithuanian : TYTO ALBA
Polish : ALBATROS EDITURA
Portuguese : CIRCULO DE LEITORES (Club Edition only)
Portuguese : DIFEL EDITORA
Romanian : RAO INTERNATIONAL PUBLISHING GROUP
Russian : EKSMO
Serbian EDITIONS : LAGUNA
What the press says
"A novel with the dimensions of a cathedral whose architecture and subtlety are revealed as one progresses, as the gaze becomes accustomed to the medieval half-light...There is an abundance of meaning and several levels of reading in this historical and detective, metaphysical and initiatory. It's in the vein of Ken Follet's bestseller, The Pillars of the Earth. We are bewitched. » Le Figaro
“Novel whose intrigue unfolds over several centuries, and whose suspense defies the imagination without ever ceasing to be plausible… a true archaeological thriller, an enigma that makes one think of the curse of TutanKhamon and the “Ten Little Negroes” of Agatha Christie. And all this phantasmagoria is built around a dream, like a pyramid that would stand on its tip… You have to dig the Earth to find the sky. The new observer
“Less tortuous historical polar, more fluid than those of Umberto Eco. These two parallel stories are well conducted with the implicit construction of Mont Saint Michel, fascinating….» The Parisian
“A book that mixes with history, mystery and archaeology. A whole procession of mysterious crimes and untold secrets that take us deep into the bowels of the sacred mountain, and make this book a historical thriller of the best vintage”. West France
"Past, present, great history and individual destinies, spirituality and obscurantism, corpses and treasure hunts... If The Angel's Promise is reminiscent of The Name of the Rose , the beautiful metaphysical thriller by Frédéric Lenoir and Violette Cabesos has above all the merit of dusting off the touristic and tiresome image of Mont Saint Michel to restore it to all its historical and religious complexity. Not without playing the romantic and sentimental card to the fullest, which makes certain particularly erudite passages pass particularly well… Devilishly captivating”. France Evening
"A scholarly thriller conceived as an archaeological treasure hunt... skillfully juggling between past and present, the authors lift the veil on the technique of cathedral builders, the origin of Celtic beliefs, monastic life in the Middle Ages, ecclesiastical trickery and the daily constraints of contemporary archaeologists… and the struggle of a monk against his guilty inclination for a beautiful healer. Nothing like a bouquet of impious feelings to exhale all the scents of a sacred place. And give back to a tourist temple, besieged by stalls and refreshments, a little of its divine mystery”. The Express
"A thrilling theological thriller, wildly romantic". She