he true-life memoir Patrice Chaplin began in City of Secrets continues here in t
he story of her spiritual initiation into the Kabbalistic tradition preserved si
nce the Middle Ages by a secret society in the pre-Roman city of Girona, Spain.
Salvador Dalí was a member of that society, as was the renowned author Umberto E
co, the filmmaker Jean Cocteau, and Jancint Verdeguer, one of the most celebrate
d Catalan poets. Importantly, so was the mysterious Berenger Sauniere, the pries
t who in the late 1800s built Rennes-le-Chƒteau in southern France, with the Tou
r Magdala, a tower that is twin to the neo-gothic tower in Girona. In this gripp
ing story that reads like the adventures of a female Castenada, Chaplin is led t
hrough a series of initiatory stages which correspond to the magical square of V
enus, containing the constellation of the Great Bear.
