Author's Note
Thirteen books of the Nag Hammadi Library were recovered. The Bedouins who found them were uncertain how many their mother had actually used to start cooking fires nor were the authorities ever completely sure none of the volumes were sold on Cairo's thriving antiquities black market.
Most city building codes prohibit use of gas in high-rise buildings, an effort to prevent what happened to Lang occurring by accident. Atlanta allows exceptions upon special permit.
Honesty requires acknowledgment of sources even if used in fictionalized form. Additionally, readers frequently e-mail me, requesting the place they can find more on some of the historical facts that form the basis of plots.
For both reasons, I include the following:
Ron Cameron's translation of the text of the Secret Book of James was most helpful, although I took considerable liberties with it to make the plotline work. I used Paul Tobin's The Rejection of Pascal's Wager: A Skeptic's Guide to Christianity and James the Brother of Jesus by Robert Eisenman in dealing with James as the blood brother of Jesus and the perpetual virginity of Mary. The description of the discovery of the Nag Hammadi Library is based on Elaine Pagels's The Gnostic Gospels.
I would be ungrateful as well as in deep trouble if I didn't also note here that my wife, Suzanne, constantly frequents history's curio shop in search of dusty and forgotten scraps of the past.
My agent, Mary Jack Wald, has infinite patience, certainly more than I deserve. Don D'Auria and his wonderful artistic, publicity and editing staff at Dorchester deserve a great deal of credit for any success of the Lang Reilly yarns.
G.L.
February 5, 2008
Gregg Loomis
