Temple is a thriller novel written by Australian author Matthew Reilly and first published in 1999. Like Reilly's other books, Temple's major attractions are the fast pace and the complexity of the action scenes.
At the time of publication, Reilly hinted at the possibility of a sequel starring the same protagonist, Professor William Race, but the release of such a book has never been officially confirmed.
Contents
Introduction
Temple is split into two stories, both set in South America: One set during the Spanish Occupation of South America and one set in 1999 at the same place.
The main focus of the former story is the journey of a monk named Alberto Santiago who becomes a traitor to his country after witnessing Spanish atrocities among the Incan civilisation. Aiding an Incan Prince named Renco Capac to escape, Santiago begins a quest to protect a special Idol - 'The Spirit of the People', an idol carved from black stone with purple veins running through it, actually carved from a meteorite that fell on earth, from the invading Spaniards. Upon his return to Spain, Santiago records his story in a transcript in San Sebastian Monastery in France.
Four hundred years later, a group of German armed militia known as the Stormtroopers raid the monastery, executing all but one of the Jesuit monks living there, recovering the Santiago manuscript. Meanwhile, another party raids DARPA (The Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency) headquarters in order to capture a new superweapon known as the Supernova. DARPA sends Colonel Frank Nash to Peru with the aid of NYU linguistics professor William Race to recover the idol before anyone else can retrieve it. Their mission: to retrieve 'the Spirit of the People' (as the natives call it), carved out of Thyrium-261, a nuclear material from a binary star system that came to Earth via a meteorite. Thyrium has the potential to provide virtually limitless clean energy, which can fuel the Supernova, a next-generation weapon of mass destruction with the power to decimate a third of the Earth's surface and bring about Doomsday.
Plot summary
William Race's adventure
Professor William Race is a young linguist, working for NYU is approached by a retired Col. Frank Nash, a physicist from the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, to translate a manuscript written in ancient Latin, to find an ancient Incan idol in the South American jungles. Race is told that his brother, Martin Race, was the one who suggested his name, and that his ex college sweetheart, Lauren O'Connor is also accompanying them. Race reluctantly agrees.
En route to Peru, Nash provides Race with photocopied pages of a copy of the Santiago Manuscript, which describes the adventures of Alberto Santiago, a Spanish missionary in ancient Peru, whilst also holding the key to the final resting place of a legendary Incan idol, allegedly made of thyrium-261, an element that, when combined with the mass destruction weapon called Supernova, would destroy a third of the Earth's mass throwing it off from its orbit and effectively killing the planet. The team travels to Cuzco, Peru with physicists Troy Copeland and Lauren O'Connor, archaeologist Gaby Lopez, anthropologist Walter Chambers and a team of six Green Berets, including Race's personal bodyguard Leo Van Lewen.
Race, translating the copy of the manuscript that Frank Nash's team had acquired prior to the flight to Peru, discovers that Santiago and his expedition ended up in Vilcafor, an Incan town deep in the Amazon. However, this was only a partially completed copy, so they didn't know what occurred after Santiago's arrival in Vilcafor. The team decide to use the information in the manuscript to make their way to Vilcafor and find out if the idol resides there.
After arriving in Cuzco, Race's team makes use of Huey helicopters to travel into the Amazon and find Vilcafor, making use of the totem pole clues detailed in the manuscript. After some time in flight, the team finds Vilcafor and lands in the town center. Using a Nucleotide Resonance Imager (NRI), the team discovered a source of Thyrium-261 to the west of Vilcafor, and headed for the source.
This led them to a finger of rock in the middle of a canyon, on which sat an ancient temple, which Lopez and Chambers deduced to be pre-Incan. Nash decided to blow open the temple's entrance with C-2 plastic explosive. However, as this was happening, the two Green Berets left to guard Vilcafor, Corporal 'Doogie' Kennedy and Corporal 'Tex' Reichart, were ambushed by a German assault team. The Germans took the town then with use of 'Apache' attack helicopters took the temple from Nash's team, taking them prisoner and putting them in the town.
Alberto Santiago's Story
Santiago's story takes place five hundred years prior to the main events of the story, in South America. It is told in the form of a story within a story, the memoirs of a Spanish priest during the discovery of South America. Santiago's manuscript appears several times in the story, with Professor Race reading and translating it, providing his comrades with crucial information to reach the idol.
Disgusted by the atrocities of his countrymen on the Incans, Spanish priest Alberto Santiago betrays them when he frees Renco Capac, an Incan prince, from a spanish prison hulk. Much of Santiago's story details his journey with Renco and a criminal named Bassario from Cuzco to the citadel at Vilcafor as they attempt to defend a sacred Incan idol from pursuing conquistadors, led by the wicked Spanish leader Hernando. The Spaniards wish to conquer the Incas and also grab a hidden treasure, as well as kill Alberto for his treachery. The trio travel day in and night out and finally make it to Vilcafor with the idol, where they hope to hide it before Hernando can find them.
At Vilcafor, Alberto is introduced to Renco's widowed sister and her young son, and the other Incans hiding in the citadel. He learns of the Vicious Rapas that come out of the temple at night, and that when made wet, the idol hums a tune which puts the Rapas in a trance. Renco has Bassario make an exact replica of the idol which is fake. Alberto also learns of a treasure hidden in a temple built by one Solon years before, and guarded by Rapas, which the Spaniards are after. The Incans and Alberto reach the temple with the idol keeping the Rapas in trance, and manage to lure them all into the temple, but are attacked by Hernando and the conquistadors before they can completely close the door. Hernando gets the "fake" idol from Renco, but before he can kill them, the conquistadors are attacked by Bassario and the Incans and the returning Rapas. In the fight, Alberto is saved by his bible as it absorbs Hernando's shot. Hernando is killed by Santiago on the rope bridge and the Spaniards are killed by the Incans. Renco then lures the Rapas back into the temple and asks that the stone door be shut behind them, thereby trapping the Rapas inside with him and the idols.
Epilogue
As Professor William Race and the others head home, Race calls and appraises the investigation officers back home about the events. He then proceeds to read the last part of Alberto Santiago's manuscript, which he gets from the village.
Alberto Santiago is now an old man, reminiscing his memories and penning them in a monastery in the mountains of Europe. Renco trapped the Rapas and the fake idol and escaped from the temple with the real one (the same way Race did) and reunited with his comrades. Bassario now has joined the Incas, Alberto married Lena and has two daughters with her. Renco and Alberto are long lived friends, until Lena and Renco pass away in old age. Alberto ends his writings with a short poem sung by the Incans, praising their hero Renco. Race notes that he has the same mark beneath his left eye as described in Renco, but at the very end has the epiphany that only Race had fallen from the sky to save the idol, while Renco hadn't. This implies that Race is in fact the one and only Chosen One as foretold by the Incans.
Characters
Civilians (American)
William Race The main protagonist. He is an ancient languages professor at New York University. He is unwillingly dragged into a US army special operation by Francis Nash. He is highly inspired by the story of Alberto Santiago's adventure with Renco Capac and several similarities are shown between him and Renco. He later kisses his love interest, Renee Becker, near the end of the story.
Troy Copeland A nuclear physicist, who is part of Nash's scam to steal the idol for hostile purposes. He was having an affair with Lauren, and using the information she got from her husband he aided Bittiker in detonating the Supernova. Race later kills him with a tank shell to the head
Lauren O'Conner Married to the brother of her college sweetheart, William Race, she too is in on Nash's scam. She was having an affair with Copeland, and giving him secrets that her husband Marty knew, which aided Copeland in setting up the Supernova with the idol for the Texans, which Lauren didn't know. Copeland later shoots her.
Walter Chambers The anthropologist of the crew. Shown as bookish but capable, and spots the threat of the rapas early. Chambers is brutally killed by vicious caimans, massive crocodilians.
Gaby Lopez The archaeologist of the team, she survives the horrors of Peru. She was seconds from death when Doogie saved her from a caiman. She later asks Doogie out for dinner.
Martin Race Brother of William Race, whom William hasn't seen in years. It is revealed towards the end that he is married to Lauren, but he in fact was being manipulated by Lauren to suit her needs.
American Armed Forces Members
Colonel Francis Nash Claims to be part of DARPA, but is revealed to be an Army man. He betrays his own squad and shoots Van Lewen and the Navy comrades. He brought along Chambers, Lopez and Race to aid him, and Copeland and Lauren to steal the idol from its rightful owner, the Incan people. He is later mutilated by the Indians and sacrificed to the rapas for his crimes.
Captain Dwayne Scott, the leader of the Green Berets. He dies a painful death when the second venture into the Incan temple results in a rapa attack.
Sergeant Leonardo Van Lewen, Race's assigned bodyguard. A considerate and resourceful man, as well as a leader by example, he helps Race in his quest to stop the Nazis and then stop Nash. He makes the ultimate sacrifice for Race, stepping in front of him when Nash brandishes a gun. Nash shoots Van Lewen anyway.
Corporal Jacob "Buzz" Cochrane is part of the team that goes into the temple for the third time. A crude and egotistical soldier, he is disliked by Race for this and later is wounded by the Nazis. Left on the rock, he is discovered by the Incans later and sacrificed to the rapas.
Corporal George "Tex" Reichart is shot fatally in the same attack that wounded Cochrane during the retrieval of the idol. One of the only members of the Green Berets apart from Van Lewen that appreciated Doogie Kennedy.
Corporal Charles "Chuck" Wilson, like Captain Scott, is mauled by rapas in the first venture into the temple. Is seemingly as crude as Cochrane, as he participates in the tasteless "80s Club", a club whose members have had sex with women born in the 1980s (the events of Temple take place in early 1999, so that means any woman in their teens, making for a very crude concept).
Corporal Douglas "Doogie" Kennedy is the only Green Beret that survives. A shy young man that is bullied by many of his fellow Green Berets for his Southern accent and his crush on Gaby Lopez, he is in fact a very smart guy and a more than capable soldier with exceptional sniper skills as well as a capable pilot. He is asked out by Gaby Lopez and accepts at the end of the book.
German BKA team
Karl Schroeder The de facto leader after the German leader is killed in the initial rapa attack, he is much like Van Lewen, leading by example and being considerate for his fellow men. He makes the sacrifice play when the team raids the Nazi armada, setting off a chlorine isotopic charge to vaporise the remaining Nazis and allowing the others to escape.
Renee Becker A special agent for the BKA along with Karl Schroeder, she is a kind woman but capable fighter. Race's love interest, she earlier dismisses his brave acts as only the adrenaline talking, but when Race disables the second Supernova, she decides that he is truly as brave as his actions demonstrates, and kisses him. They're seen together at the end of the book.
Uli Peck Masquerading as Nazi soldier Uli Kahr, he infiltrated the Nazis to feed information to the BKA. Rescued Race and Renee from certain execution at the hands of the Nazis and aided them in disabling the Nazi Supernova.
Nazi team
Heinrich Anistaze Ex-German secret policeman, brutal and lethal, seeks to set up a Nazi ruled world by crashing the U.S. economy with Odilo Ehrhardt's plan and using the thyrium from the idol to fuel the Nazi Supernova. Later brutally killed by William Race by decapitation with the blades of a helicopter.
Odilo Ehrhardt Ex-Nazi guard at a Nazi concentration camp in World War Two. Known as a heartless killer during his time with the Nazi regime. Set up and leads the Stormtroopers, his neo-Nazi regime based in Chile. Is killed by William Race after being shot by Race and then blown up by his own hydrazine explosive trap, while failing to kill Race.
Republican Army of Texas
Earl Bittiker A former Navy Seal, he formed the Texans as a militia group that raided government buildings. Later merged with the Oklahoma Freedom Fighters and a Japanese doomsday group in order to acquire a Supernova and use it to destroy the world. Killed by William Race after being trapped by Race in a falling tank.
Santiago's story
Alberto Santiago Main protagonist, Spanish priest and missionary who on his journey with the Spaniards in their quest to conquer the Incas, witnesses the brutality of his countrymen and decides to betray them and help the Incans instead, inspired by the Incans and their spirit and will. Kills Hernando Pizarro to save the idol. Marries Lena, Renco's sister, and later returns to France to write the manuscript.
Prince Renco Capac Incan prince, highly skilled and hailed by the Incans as their hero, imprisoned on a ship, is released by Santiago, and who partners with the latter to confiscate and protect a sacred Incan idol from the Spanish Conquistadors. Presumed killed by Race before Race discovered he in fact survived luring the rapas into the temple, using this information to himself survive the temple.
Lena An Incan princess, she similarly mirrors Renee Becker with Race in being Santiago's love interest.
Bassario The disgraced son of a royal stonemason, he is convicted to prison. Freed by Renco in order to use his skills to construct a fake idol in order to fool Hernando Pizarro. Initially leaves Renco and Santiago to their deaths at the hands of the Spanish conquistadors, but returns in the nick of time to save their lives, proving he was still an honourable man.
Hernando Pizarro The brother of the Spanish conqueror's governor, Francisco, a brutal man who revelled in killing the Incans and stopped at nothing to possess the idol. He was killed by Santiago by being dropped off the rope bridge.
Castino A tribesman of the subjugated Chanca clan, he joined the Spanish conquistadors led by Hernando in order to get revenge on Renco, using his tracking skills to aid the Spanish. He was decapitated by Renco in the final battle atop the temple.