A James Rollins novel is always cause for celebration. You are guaranteed a well-researched adventure filled with action that is typically based on some piece of lost ancient history that forms the premise of an eye-opening and insightful read. TRUST NO ONE is a stand-alone novel that allows Rollins to briefly step away from his stellar Sigma Force series.

Rollins opens with a list of both historical and modern facts, each of which are related to the 18th-century mystic and occultist, the Comte de Saint-Germain. Among the myriad rumors spoken about Saint-Germain is the text he wrote that may hold the key to, among other things, immortality. Those who seek this tome are often branded as witches, and they are well aware that witches usually end up being burned at the stake.

"In true James Rollins fashion, TRUST NO ONE is an exhilarating ride that is impossible to put down.... It is mind-blowing just how much truth is absorbed through these wondrous pages."

This brings us to a group of students at the University of Exeter, all of whom are enrolled in a postgraduate program covering the history of witchcraft, folklore and spiritualism. One of them, Sharyn Karr, is about to have her entire world turned upside down. While working in the school library one evening, Sharyn is approached by her department head, the esteemed Professor Julian Wright, who thrusts upon her what appears to be the handwritten and encrypted diary of Saint-Germain. He wants her to hold it until he asks for it back and issues her a warning: Trust no one.

Unfortunately, this exchange is witnessed by some individuals who really want this book. The library is burned to the ground, and Professor Wright perishes in the blaze. Sharyn shares the details with her friends and roommates, and they are horrified to see what happened to the library. Among the students she needs to befriend on the frenzied mission and trek ahead of her is Duncan Maxwell, a rival she does not fully trust or care for. But it turns out that he is the 16th in line to the British Crown.

Sharyn and her mates will move around Europe in a wild effort to keep the diary from getting into the hands of the wrong people before they are able to use their expertise to decipher it. The history of this cursed text is such that the individual entrusted with it usually does not meet a happy end, so they are in more danger than they ever could have conceived. They are contacted by Malick Laurent, who represents an ancient order tasked with protecting the book and all it contains. He tells them that they are being pursued by an order even older than his, the Confrère, the same group that is known to burn witches or heretics at the stake in the name of a holy order that goes all the way to the Vatican.

Once they begin to learn what is in Saint-Germain’s text, they are led on a quest that rivals something from Indiana Jones when it comes to ancient lost artifacts of immense power. Sharyn only knows to trust her own instincts and, indeed, to trust no one.

In true James Rollins fashion, TRUST NO ONE is an exhilarating ride that is impossible to put down. He finishes as he does with nearly all of his novels by separating fact from fiction regarding everything that we have just experienced. It is mind-blowing just how much truth is absorbed through these wondrous pages.