Sistina, Brian Kenneth Swain's gripping and thought-provoking new novel, is a story two thousand years in the making. The events set in motion following Christ's crucifixion build to a crescendo during the Italian High Renaissance and will test the faith of the story's historical and modern-day characters, as well as that of readers.

When a violent earthquake damages Michelangelo's magnificent frescoes, a team of experts undertakes the Vatican's most important restoration in centuries, only to discover a perplexing secret hidden for five hundred years beneath the chapel's plaster ceiling. The message, both cryptic and incomplete due to the rash actions of a tourist at the time of the quake, baffles the team and awakens the attention of a small group of powerful men--men who have waited centuries in the shadows, hoping for the elusive clue that will lead them to Christendom's ultimate artifact.

It is a tale of murder, revenge, ecclesiastical connivance, and ancient secrets--all constructed on an elaborate foundation of religious history, political intrigue, and technological wizardry. Sistina, Swain's most controversial novel to date, will leave you breathless.