The Parchment Maze

The international bestseller.

Some see the as saints and deities, while great artists such as Ovid, Dante and Orpheus described them as "shades". Thousands of others have called them angels, but few have ever descended to the bowels of the earth to discover their faces. Today, however, for the first time, a human being is close to grasping their true essence. While studying similarities between Christianity and Orphism, archeologist Vera Kandilova stumbles across perplexing symbols ties to a prehistoric Balkan civilization that mysteriously disappeared 5000 years ago. What begins as a purely academic scavenger hunt across Switzerland, Russia, Italy and Bulgaria leads her to frescoes in the Roman catacombs, a medieval cryptic manuscript called "The Parchment Maze". The intellectual puzzle quickly gets visceral - after a series of murders, thefts of valuable artifacts and kidnapping, the clues show Vera the path to uncovering the secret of the legendary incorporeal ones - those who jealously guard the most ancient knowledge and grant insight only to enlightened individuals such as Jesus, Enoch and Orpheus. Vera is determined to follow a trail of clues before the handsome assassin Ariman, with pale skin and colorful eyes, can obliterate them. An underground brotherhood led by the ghoulish Incorporeal One has raised Ariman to be a cold-blooded automaton. However, the merciless killer is also on a mission of his own - the only thing that could possibly tempt him from his path is love, since angels are capable of loving as no human being can...

"The Parchment Maze" by Ludmila Filipova is an archival suspense thriller, which topped national best-seller lists for years. In 2012, "National Geographic" made a film based on the book, entitled "Sword in the Stone & the Orpheus Amulet".