The last Cato - Matilde Asensi

A few days ago I finished reading this book that is quite interesting "The Last Cato" in Spanish Matilde Asensi. Win When my friend gave me intrigued me ever knowing what or who was the famous last Cato.

The thing is that my friend told me that if I had liked the Da Vinci Code, this was for me and I was right.

The book itself deals with certain events occurring and appear without explanation. One of the protagonists is Dr. Ottavia Salina, who is a paleontologist and works in the secret archives located in the basement of the Vatican. Work with unique and valuable manuscripts, documents, books that have not seen the light and are being deciphered in order to decide whether to go or stay saved. Ottavia is the eighth child (hence the name) of a large Sicilian family in which in the course of the story know its affiliation with the Mafia.

Dr. Salina is a sister member of the order of the Virgin Mary Venturosa not using habits and living a little more relaxed than the cloister. On the other hand, has a personality distinctly feminist, does not tolerate the fact is submission to a man or a man considered inferior by being a woman, a quality that I love the character. For example this thought of when asked scornfully why not use habits:
"The tone was deeply offensive, but I'm not going to be intimidated. At this point in my life in the city, had passed many times through the same situation and was tanned in a thousand battles for my gender. "

Or in this other passage in which is the top excuse for what they are required to develop or investigate and eventually let the pride and arrogance in it act as a defense to the machismo that surrounds it:

"Monsignor Tournier was the only one showed signs of being alive when I finished talking. While the others were silent with surprise, he started with a sarcastic smirk that made me ponder his outspoken opposition to use my services before I came into the cabinet. I could hear him saying dismissively "A woman ...?" So it was his sly and sarcastic attitude that made me take a hundred and eighty degree turn and say:
- ... Although, on reflection, maybe I could do it, provided they give me enough time for that. "

On this occasion, Dr. Salina is called to decrypt certain marks found on the body of an Ethiopian who died in a plane crash. Scarification are certain that presents and do not have much sense. These include crosses of various styles and the number of seven Greek letters that can decipher when they see the word "STAVROS" which means cross in Greek. Next to the corpse, they discover a trunk which has spread mysterious wood chips. Only connoisseurs know they are against the cross pieces of Veritas, the True Cross on which rested the body of Christ after the crucifixion and discovered centuries ago by St. Helena, mother of Emperor Constantine.

The only condition imposed is not to make further inquiries about the case, only mechanically comply with the assigned work and nothing else. But she, drawing a comment from his brother and nephew Pierantonio computer expert, find the Internet is the Ethiopian who occupies it. Find out who has stolen the pieces of the cross scattered in several churches of various denominations around the world with unknown purposes and not knowing who did the work.

Completed some time and having already finished his order, his guard-companion unexpectedly the Swiss head of the Vatican Swiss Guard Kaspar Glauser-Roister withdraws the case. And she in a riot of rebellion it faces reveals he knows what is cooking behind the deceased:

"- You realize captain - clearly vocalize to lose no detail of what he was saying that Abi-Rukh Iyasus, our Ethiopian can not only be a small piece in a big gear, for some reason has been launched and has begun to steal holy relics of the True Cross? You realize, Captain - God, how desperation drove me to emphasize my words like that! It seemed an ancient Greek theater actor speaking to the gods, that behind all this can only be a religious sect that considers itself a descendant of traditions dating back to the origins of the Eastern Roman Empire, Byzantium and the emperor Constantine, whose mother, St. Helena, besides ordering erect the basilica of St. Catherine in Sinai, discovered the True Cross of Christ in 326? "

After this is banished as punishment for "miserable people of the province of Connaught where they were going to bury me?" In Ireland.

However, before he could record his admission to the place, suddenly returned to the Vatican is putting it back into the case. This time, apart from the Swiss cold she calls "The Rock", is added the professor of Greco-Roman Museum in Alexandria, an expert in Byzantine Paleography History and the Egyptian Coptic (Arabic religion is derived from the preaching of St. Marcos) Farag Boswell's grandson Kenneth Boswell who discovered the Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus, whose chemistry with Dr. Salina is in sight since you see it.

And he explains that what he had stolen Iyasus are fragments of the Red Cross Ligna called Veritas and that most of reliquaries in the Orthodox Churches of the world that keep pieces, these are mysteriously disappearing. And they have called in the Vatican to clarify the theft and what is behind.

So incredible unorthodox, Farag and The Rock have stolen a manuscript from the Monastery of Saint Catherine in Sinai and called Iyasus Code, which reveals to them after many days of tireless translation by Dr. Salina that there is a secret order called Staurofílakes that has been charged with caring Verita Cross. The head is called the maximum or Archimandrite Cato and since it assumes, continue in his role until he dies and is replaced by one which follows the work. The manuscript tells the story of several Cato, noting Cato of Utica, an admirable man who transcended the story of a historical event became a paradigm of freedom shaped the pen of Seneca when he said "Neither Cato lived and died freedom , nor was already released, killing Cato '. Names of 36 Catos history and realize that through the centuries were followed beatitudes and woes and gave his public life, had been infiltrated by non-believers, so they devised a test system, a process of initiation that whoever I wanted to belong to the order, he must overcome. Thus, the three embark in search of Eden of Staurofílakes guided by the Divine Comedy and which are seven tests in seven cities (cornices or levels in the writing of Dante), the atonement of the seven deadly sins: "Rome his pride, Ravenna for his envy, anger Jerusalem, Athens for their sloth, avarice Constantinople, Alexandria and Antioch by his greed for luxury. "

How they go through difficult tests at 7, moving from city to city using technology in their favor and overcoming them by exposing the vast scientific knowledge that they have between the three, are solving puzzles and end of each test, are marked with scarification ( the same as Iyasus), with captain "The Rock" which is distinguished by different scarification. They put the ostrich feather, the feather of Maat it symbolizes justice, while others are looped cross.

The ending is quite unexpected, since they reach the Garden of Eden which they call Paradeis, described as a huge underground cave somewhere they identify as in Ethiopia, which has settled three peoples who live in the old building maximum sensory activities and discover the secrets of Staurofílakes since they belong to your order.

On the way to overcome tests, Dr. Boswell fall in love And this fact constitutes the romantic touch of the novel, my husband says that is a mixture of Dan Brown and Danielle Steel. Look at this passage more than one or some must have lived:

"I was afraid. My heart was beating so hard it seemed that I was going out through the mouth. I pounded on his chest like a scared little animal. "Do not, Ottavia, do not do," she whispered a voice in his head. There was still time to turn back. Why did it have to be that night? Why not tomorrow or around the surface? Why not wait until you receive the blessing of the Church?

- Why not leave it forever and never to do it? - I told myself aloud reproachfully.

"Now, Ottavia ', tried to cheer me up. "You are by wanting, you die by it, do you fear?" "

Poor woman! And when left behind the fears:

"I lost track of time and lost my heart, which merged with yours forever. I stopped being me, I stopped being the Ottavia Salina that had existed until then, to become a blaze of passion and endless love. I let myself go to bed but can not remember how, because the taste of her mouth was so intense that I thought was the taste of life itself, focusing for me on the lips of Farag Boswell "

During the initiation she realizes that her family, especially his mother is head of the Sicilian Mafia and that she and her brother Pierantonio were pushed to the religious life as a kind of expiation or purgation of the sins that were committed to the activities of the mafia.

At the end Ottavia and Boswell decided to join their lives and live a normal life in the world and Glauser-Roister, well, had an unexpected ending, I assure you that if you read the book, except that they like, they will discover who the new Cato ...

Ottavia and Farag receive a letter and Kaspar and in his words:

"The letter of Captain Glauser-Roister, written by Captain Glauser-Roister and the name of Captain Glauser-Roister on the envelope, was signed by Cato CCLVIII."

It is particularly admirable in Matilde Asensi the linking of historical fact with fiction, making them seem to fit so that the whole framework of a vast conspiracy that makes sense. Linking the Divine Comedy with the initiation process of Staurofílakes is exceptional. During my time in the classroom, obviously the reading of that book seem tedious, sharing the opinion of Dr. Ottavia Salina. Never got to learn the secrets that were kept in it and now reading "The Last Cato" I think I missed out on something good. But I asked someone else if he ever read it, getting a positive response that I thought was going to embarrass me by my laziness, then asked if it was a readable and the surprise was that I said "Nooo, it was boring and tedious A total torture! "What a relief!

Greetings to all.