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The Forbidden Book [Kindle Edition]

Joscelyn Godwin , Guido Mina di Sospiro
4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)

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Book Description

A multi-faceted mystery that incorporates the most serious and sensitive issue of our time: religious extremism. The evocative setting of Venice and the Veneto dominates the action, supplemented by vivid scenes in Santiago de Compostela, Provence, Washington, and the Vatican. Occult beliefs and practices fuel the action as the main characters become embroiled in an aristocratic sex magick plot.

While on one level The Forbidden Book is a murder mystery set against the conflicts of Islam and the West, the book also delves deep into esoteric knowledge and practice, thanks to Guido Mina di Sospiro's extensive knowledge of Catholicism and Joscelyn Godwin's authoritative studies of the western esoteric tradition. Underlying the fast paced action, the reader will find a profound treatment of moral and political dilemmas, the conflict of religions, and the frightening possibilities of the occult.

Guido Mina di Sospiro is an award-winning, internationally published novelist born in Argentina, raised in Italy, and educated in the United States. A graduate of the University of Southern California, he lives in the Washington, DC, area with his wife and their three sons.

Joscelyn Godwin was born in England and lives in Hamilton, New York, where he is professor of music at Colgate University. He graduated with bachelors and masters degrees from Cambridge University and has a PhD from Cornell University. He is a composer, musicologist, and translator, known for his work on ancient music, paganism, and music in the occult. He has written, edited, or translated more than twenty books for multiple publishers worldwide.




Editorial Reviews

Review

"The Forbidden Book is a modern masterpiece on many levels." --Robert Schoch, Ph.D., New Dawn Magazine

"Watch out Dan Brown and Umberto Eco! Here's a real esoteric thriller written by some real Illuminati who know the real thing and aren't afraid to let the secret out. Sex, magic, politics, and mystery. The Forbidden Book is a gripping, exciting, and illuminating read." --Gary Lachman, author of A Dark Muse

"This is simply the best work of occult fiction that I've ever read and sets the standard for the genre." --Greg Kaminsky, Occult of Personality

"The Forbidden Book is special for one key reason: the alchemical secrets woven into the story are all for real." --Sasha Chaitow, Phoenix Rising Academy

"This is a really excellent book--gripping, thought-provoking, mysterious, deep and resonant with esoteric knowledge. It keeps you turning the pages in a most compelling way. I couldn't put it down." --Graham Hancock, author of Fingerprints of the Gods

About the Author

Joscelyn Godwin was born in England and lives in Hamilton, New York, where he is professor of music at Colgate University. He is a composer, musicologist, and translator, known for his work on ancient music, paganism, and music in the occult.

Guido Mina di Sospiro is an award-winning, internationally published novelist born in Argentina, raised in Italy, and educated in the United States. A graduate of the University of Southern California, he lives in the Washington, DC, area with his wife and their three sons.

Product Details

  • File Size: 1125 KB
  • Print Length: 292 pages
  • Publisher: The Disinformation Company (April 10, 2012)
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B007UPDB68
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • X-Ray: Not Enabled
  • Lending: Not Enabled
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #272,492 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Bravo! May 11, 2012
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
Joscelyn Godwin is an internationally renowned expert on esotericism, and his delightful fictional team effort with Guido Mina di Sospiro is guaranteed to offer the layperson as well as esotericism-expert hours of sinful pleasure. Their novel focuses on an actual, mysterious book (possessing esoteric significance) belonging to a characteristically twisted and fascinating Italian noble family. Much of the plot is driven by the gradual unravelling of the significance of the forbidden book; what adds an intriguing dimension to the novel is the manner in which very real crime, elements of present-day terrorism, and sexual politics become part of the general psychomachia. Di Sospiro and Godwin's narrative strength lies in the frightening plausibility of their characters, that handle the at-times lunatic atmosphere of the novel with surprising grace, and a plethora of all-too-human emotion. The authors take care to ensure that their most minor characters are as carefully caricatured and significant as their major ones. Someone should let Quentin Tarantino know about this novel; he could easily make an engaging film version of it that may well rival Roman Polanski's grossly unappreciated and under-rated `Ninth Gate' (which is itself based on Arturo Perez-Reverte's superb book The Club Dumas). The Forbidden Book's only weakness is that the drawings of some crucial floor plans come right at the end of this Kindle novel; this makes the illustrations appear more superfluous than they really are, especially since one cannot really flip through a Kindle book. An odd mixture of satire and erudition, The Forbidden Book manages to succeed on a staggering number of narrative levels: that of a passionate love story, a thriller, an academic puzzle, a wild and scary polemic, and above all a labour of love by two remarkable writers. Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments...as an actor-turned-poet once said.

Nadya Chishty-Mujahid, Cairo, Egypt
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars This Magic Book Is Real.... August 8, 2012
Format:Kindle Edition
Book Review - The Forbidden Book by Guido Mina di Sospiro and Joscelyn Godwin
Published by The Disinformation Company, Ltd., [...]
Copyright 2012
Review by Mark Stavish

The Forbidden Book is a wonderful page turner in the style of Dan Brown's DaVinci Code and The Rule of Four by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason, only unlike these bestsellers, di Sospiro and Godwin deliver the goods, not only in story, but for many readers, in esoteric content as well. Opening with a bang, literally, and a large one at that, The Forbidden Book takes its readers into an occult world just below the surface of our own. Occult in both the general and specific meanings of the word in that not only are we introduced to the world of magic and alchemy, and sex magic at that, but also into a world view not generally known, that of Traditionalism. Our unlikely hero Leo Kavenaugh is of course a professor, and an instructor of Italian at that. The damsel in distress and love interest is the lovely Orsina, who was once his teaching assistant and now married to a wealthy industrialist. However, while the plot set-up is predictable, its unfoldment is clean and enticing all the way to the end as the mystery around the forbidden book, The Magical World of the Heroes, written by Cesare Della Riviera in 1605, unfolds and family secrets around forbidden power, incest, hubris and greed embodied in Orsina's uncle Baron Emanuele are revealed. All of this is against the background of a modern Europe on the brink of civil war as religious tensions break through the veneer of cafe culture, and the politics of identity assert themselves via shade of Colin Wison's book The Mind Parasites, where mind control is not about controlling all people, but is about controlling the right people.

For our readers, the Della Riviera's book is a real work, not unlike the Hypnoerotomachia Poliphili which was translated by Joscelyn Godwin (1999), and formed the basis for Caldwell and Thomason's novel. Many in the English speaking world first became introduced to The Magical World of the Heroes as it was mentioned in Introduction to Magic - Rituals and Practical Techniques for the Magus, Guido Stucco's translation of the collected works of the UR Group, an Italian esoteric lodge centered around the teachings of Julius Evola. Evola, a self-styled Baron, advocated a philosophy which believed that the modern world is essentially decadent and that traditional norms, hierarchies, and values are the only means of restoring sanity through political and occult methods.

I found The Forbidden Book a fascinating and a wonderful first novel for this pair of brilliant scholars, showing that deep thinking, scholarly skill, and creativity can go hand-in-hand and create a novel that one can be pleasantly read in an afternoon or two. While I did not particularly enjoy reading The Forbidden Book in its electronic form, Disinformation has been bought by Red Wheel/Weiser and a paperback edition will be released in early 2013.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A dizzying, highly entertaining mystery trip! April 21, 2012
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
A fascinating whodunnit, told in exotic locales that, as it weaves multiple streams of swirling events with esoteric practices thrown into the mix, challenges the imagination and questions the philosophical underpinnings of today's dangerous dogmatic zealotry, regardless of religious beliefs. Guido Mina di Sospiro and his co-author Joscelyn Godwin have done a masterful job. Bravissimo!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars A "Master Key" to understand our times
"The Forbidden Book" is one of those rare works of contemporary fiction that escape the compartimentalization of the literary market and delight both the imagination and the... Read more
Published 5 days ago by Ana Margarida Esteves
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent; well-paced; imaginative
This novel moves along briskly, developing the characters well, and making the reader try to guess who is behind the "bad acts", while being informative about the esoteric... Read more
Published 13 days ago by Joe - pro visibility
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent
Gets better by the page truly a classic
The authors style is captivating
Crime, magic, love and mystery makes this book AAA
Published 22 days ago by Stephen A. Scott
1.0 out of 5 stars seriously lame
a dan brown wannabe, with Hannibal's Italy thrown in, reads like a revenge from esoterisists who did a 'me too and see' i can do one better with a sprinkling of genuine alchemical... Read more
Published 4 months ago by aiya
3.0 out of 5 stars Occult-themed books are hard to find!
I enjoyed this story and read it quickly to find out what would happen.

I really liked the grandfather character who appeared to be modeled upon Traditionalist... Read more
Published 5 months ago by Andrew James
4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, informative fiction
Started reading the Kindle book but have not had much time to get very into it. What I've read so far is very good.
Published 7 months ago by George Urbaniak
4.0 out of 5 stars A fun amusement for those who know the author
This book can be considered a private joke between Professor Godwin and those who have read his books, specifically his translations of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili and Julius... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Avery Morrow
5.0 out of 5 stars The forbidden book
The book was intriguing from the first pages.
Location of the story - Georgetown and Northern Italy are decribed very exact and belivable. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Alexander
5.0 out of 5 stars If you like the novels of Charles Williams
If you like the novels of Charles Williams or a good novel of ideas, you are in for a treat. The main character is arguably the "forbidden busk" and its seventeenth-century... Read more
Published 11 months ago by Will Hard
4.0 out of 5 stars when will a paper copy be available?
for those who live or work where kindles don't operate, when will a paper copy be available for us to purchase?
Published 11 months ago by Mike The Mathematician
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