Fingerprints of the Gods by Graham Hancock

Subtitled "The Evidence of Earth's Lost Civilization," Hancock systematically establishes a case for a human presence on this planet long before what is currently accepted. Beginning with a map drawn nearly 500 years ago, Hancock enthusiastically points out that the detailed Antarctic coastline depicted could only have been based on source documents created before the last ice age began. There's no other way to explain the map, Hancock insists, because Antarctica's coastline has been covered in ice a mile thick for nearly 5,000 years. This was a full 1,000 years before current wisdom tells us Earth's "first" civilizations came together. How could they map a land under ice? And assuming a lack of ice, neither the Phoenicians nor the Egyptians possessed the ability to determine longitude and thus create such eerily accurate renditions.

From dry maps, Hancock travels the planet, searching through dusty libraries and dustier legends. Could this explain the lost Atlantis? Who constructed the Great Pyramid, and what does it signify? Was there a global tectonic shift of catastrophic proportions? These and other questions are explored from the Inca to the Sphinx in this long - but well-worth it - read. Hancock calls us a species with amnesia, with true memories available to us only now in our mythology. His book should make us wonder what we've lost, and certainly how it could affect our future.

So find a quiet corner, and settle in. Many of Hancock's points may call for further explanation, as he writes assuming the reader has at least a passing acquaintance with the sciences. But you don't need to be a rocket scientist to understand his primary theory, and the book does contain several photographs(!). Fingerprints of the Gods deserves your attention, as do Hancock's assertions. But the exercising of your imagination, not to mention the fantastic conversation this book will inspire, should prove a just reward.

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