Magic and Science: can these two subjects actually be related and interchangeable, or is there any relationship at all between them?
In Grail Mysterium: An Adventure on the Heights by Thomas Kaplan-Mansfield, he brings us a book touted to be somewhere between Harry Potter and the Da Vinci Code. I enjoyed both of these works to a degree and was interested to see how this work would represent the connection.
In Boston College a group of friends are beginning to notice strange happenings. Students with high marks are dropping out; illness is running rampant; and Jack Knecht, a senior psych major, thinks he has seen a ghost. Not that he is sure, but he saw a hooded figure pass into a locked area of fencing and enter a building which is locked up for remodeling. Checking the locks to make sure, he is just a bit uncomfortable. Known as somewhat of a dreamer, he is a huge Hogwarts buff and believes in the idea of magic. He knows his friends will not believe him, and his girlfriend Fran will question his sanity.
Unable to put his vision aside, he talks Fran into checking out Gasson, which had been undergoing a major remodeling for over the past year. In order to get into the building, they would have to climb over the fence and break in. Fran finds this part of Jack to be a part of what draws her; she is not the believer or dreamer he is, but she is game to check out the old empty and out of bounds building.
Little do either of them know that they have set a chain of events in action that cannot be stopped. It will take them and seven of their closest friends to find the mystery surrounding Gasson, and the ghosts that seem to be ensconced. Looking for information, each of the friends herald information from their own studies. Is it possible that the ghosts have tracked the Templar knights and the Holy Grail to Boston College and this place in history?
That seems to be the message, yet only Jack and Fran are at the center--when magic begins to evolve, they are both excited and yet dismayed. Finding themselves in the middle of a centuries old mystery, fighting against evil ghosts, a bull and a dragon, their quest for the grail is solidified when they come upon an old map. Will they succeed in this strange quest and save the college? Can they and their friends survive against the odds and with the secret knowledge they now carry?
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