True Raiders: The Untold Story of the 1909 Expedition to Find the Legendary Ark of the Covenant

True Raiders is The Lost City of Z meets The Da Vinci Code, from critically acclaimed author Brad Ricca.

This book tells the untold true story of Monty Parker, a British rogue nobleman who, after being dared to do so by Ava Astor, the so-called "most beautiful woman in the world," headed a secret 1909 expedition to find the fabled Ark of the Covenant. Like a real-life version of Raiders of the Lost Ark, this incredible story of adventure and mystery has almost been completely forgotten today.

In 1908, Monty is approached by a strange Finnish scholar named Valter Juvelius who claims to have discovered a secret code in the Bible that reveals the location of the Ark. Monty assembles a ragtag group of blueblood adventurers, a renowned psychic, and a Franciscan father, to engage in a secret excavation just outside the city walls of Jerusalem.

Using recently uncovered records from the original expedition and several newly translated sources, True Raiders is the first retelling of this group's adventures- in the space between fact and faith, science and romance.

ISBN-13: 9781250846723

Media Type: Paperback

Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

Publication Date: 12-13-2022

Pages: 368

Product Dimensions: 5.30(w) x 8.10(h) x 1.10(d)

BRAD RICCA is the author of the Edgar Award-nominated Mrs. Sherlock Holmes, Olive the Lionheart, and Super Boys, winner of the Ohioana Book Award for Nonfiction. He won the St. Lawrence Book Award for American Mastodon. Ricca lives and works in Cleveland.

Table of Contents

Persons in Their Order of Appearance xi

The Key xiii

Part 1 The Cipher 1

Part 2 Underground 59

Part 3 The King in Copper 161

Part 4 Raiders 229

Part 5 A Black Star 261

Epilogue 303

Notes 309

Bibliography 339

Acknowledgments 341

Index 345

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