--- title: Sorrowful Mysteries by Anthony P. Jones Called 'The Da Vinci Code on Steroids' by Producer George Folsey Jr. description: The late Hollywood producer behind Animal House and Coming to America endorsed the Virginia author's Catholic thriller before his death in December 2024. author: Darie Nani (Editor-in-Chief) date: 2026-05-11T17:41:49.068Z updated: 2026-06-29T08:43:58.701Z canonical: https://www.richmanmagazine.com/article/anthony-p-jones-sorrowful-mysteries-da-vinci-code-on-steroids image: https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/image_123650291 (3).jpg categories: Fiction content_type: Spotlight region: United States publication: Rich Books about: - type: Person name: Anthony P. Jones description: "Anthony P. Jones is a Virginia-based thriller author and former Morgan Stanley stockbroker. Born in Kenbridge, Virginia, he was the first Black broker hired by Morgan Stanley in Nashville, Tennessee, and later in Richmond, Virginia, where he spent 15 years in finance before leaving to write full-time. Diagnosed with dyslexia at 35, he enrolled in creative writing courses at the University of Virginia. He has published four novels: Operation Smokeout, Red States, D8 With F8, and Sorrowful Mysteries, a Catholic thriller published by Palmetto Publishing in 2026 that the late Hollywood producer George Folsey Jr. called The Da Vinci Code on steroids. He has said he has 11 more completed manuscripts ready for publication." url: https://anthonypjones.com jobTitle: Thriller Author sameAs: - https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-p-jones-1442322/ - https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAnthonyPJones - https://www.instagram.com/authoranthonypjones/ - https://www.youtube.com/@tonyjones3230 --- George Folsey Jr., the Hollywood producer and editor behind Animal House, The Blues Brothers, Trading Places, Coming to America, and Michael Jackson's Thriller video, described Anthony P. Jones's fourth novel as "The Da Vinci Code on steroids" before his death in December 2024. Sorrowful Mysteries, a Catholic thriller published by Palmetto Publishing in 2026, is the book that drew the comparison. ### Book: Sorrowful Mysteries *A Novel* By Anthony P. Jones Father Raphael Kadir, a six-foot-eight Palestinian-American priest who serves as the Vatican's covert operative, is deployed when 39 Catholic priests are murdered across the United States by a rogue group of deacons demanding the Pope allow priests to marry. The investigation draws Raphael into a world of Knights Templar lore, Oak Island treasure, Freemason conspiracies, and an assassination attempt on the Pope himself. [Buy on Author Website](https://www.anthonypjones.com) ## A Vatican Spy, 39 Dead Priests, and Knights Templar Fiction The novel follows Father Raphael Kadir, a six-foot-eight Palestinian-American priest who serves as the Vatican's covert operative. When 39 Catholic priests are murdered across the United States by a group calling itself the Deacons of Righteousness, the Pope dispatches Raphael to stop the killings and identify the group's leader. The Deacons' demand is straightforward: they want the Pope to reverse the 900-year-old ban on priestly marriage. Their methods are not. The dead priests were all previously accused of molestation, and the group operates under symbols borrowed from both the Knights Templar and the Knights of Malta. The combination of real ecclesiastical politics and fictional conspiracy gives the book a similar texture to Dan Brown's work, though the theological arguments here run deeper. Several chapters are devoted to first-century Timothy and whether Christ's apostles, most of whom were married, intended celibacy for their successors. Raphael himself is an unusual protagonist for the genre. Born in Palestine to a local mother and an American serviceman, he was sent to the United States at five, raised Catholic, ordained as a priest, and then trained by the FBI. He carries a titanium sword fitted with a relic of Saint Peter and answers directly to the Pope. The character borrows from action-thriller conventions, but Anthony roots him in Catholic theology: Raphael is tormented by demonic visitations, offers sacraments between sword fights, and finds himself drawn to a journalist named Sydney Waddick in ways that test his vows. > "A powerful and intriguing story of a centuries-old battle within the Roman Catholic Church. Written with a full grasp of the hierarchy of the Church, Mr. Jones populates this novel with a memorable romance and a plot whose many twists are surprising." > — George Folsey Jr. The plot expands from there into Oak Island treasure lore, Freemason politics, a conspiracy that reaches all the way to Rome, and the question of whether relics from Christ's crucifixion are hidden in a vault beneath Nova Scotia. The scope is deliberately wide. Anthony weaves in real Catholic organizations such as CORPUS (Corps of Reserve Priests United for Service) and Married Priests Now, alongside fictional ones, anchoring the conspiracy in arguments that actual clergy have been making for decades. ## How Priestly Celibacy Became a Thriller Plot The central political question in Sorrowful Mysteries is not fictional. The Catholic Church has roughly 45,000 active priests in the United States, down from 60,000 in 1975. An estimated 150,000 priests worldwide have left the ministry to marry. The novel's antagonists cite these figures directly, and their argument tracks closely with those made by real advocacy groups. The book takes no editorial position on the debate, but it does let the characters argue both sides at length: one chapter features a bishops' conference where a proposal to fund college education in exchange for limited-term priestly service is introduced, modeled on the military's ROTC program. The Oak Island subplot draws on genuine history as well. The island, off the coast of Nova Scotia, has been the subject of treasure-hunting expeditions since 1795. A real syndicate has spent millions attempting to reach what sonar and cameras have suggested is a vault beneath the island floor. In the novel, the vault is tied to the Knights Templar and their wealth from the Temple of Jerusalem. How Anthony connects that treasure to his protagonist is one of the book's later reveals. ## From Morgan Stanley to Catholic Fiction Anthony, who goes by Tony, did not begin as a writer. Born in Kenbridge, Virginia, he broke barriers as the first Black stockbroker hired by Morgan Stanley in Nashville, Tennessee, and later in Richmond, Virginia. He spent 15 years in finance before leaving to write full-time. At 35, he was diagnosed with dyslexia. He enrolled in creative writing courses at the University of Virginia and began producing novels. Sorrowful Mysteries is his fourth published book, following Operation Smokeout, Red States, and D8 With F8. He has said he has 11 more manuscripts completed and ready for publication. The shift from finance to fiction was not as abrupt as it sounds. Anthony has described his time on Wall Street as an education in high-stakes decision-making, pressure, and reading people, all of which appear in his writing. His novels lean toward cinematic set pieces: Raphael's confrontations with the Deacons play out in abandoned theaters, cemeteries, and hotel rooms, and the pacing reads more like a screenplay than a literary novel. That quality is likely what caught Folsey's attention. ## Endorsements From Hollywood and the FBI The book has drawn endorsements from two different corners of the entertainment world. Folsey, who died on 29 December 2024 at 85, spent decades at the center of American comedy filmmaking. He edited and produced some of the most commercially successful films of the 1970s and 1980s, working repeatedly with John Landis and John Hughes. His father, George Folsey Sr., was an Oscar-nominated cinematographer whose career stretched back to silent film, giving the younger Folsey an unusually long institutional memory for what makes popular storytelling work. The Da Vinci Code comparison was not given casually: Folsey read Jones's earlier novels and maintained contact with him over several years. Jim Clemente, a retired FBI supervisory special agent with 22 years in the bureau, offered a separate endorsement. Clemente worked the DC Sniper case and the Whitewater investigation, later became a writer and producer on CBS's Criminal Minds (2010 to 2019), and created the Audible original BLUEBEARD starring Joseph Fiennes. He called the novel "a nail-biting mystery thriller embedded in a complex world of secrecy and violence." His background in behavioral profiling and criminal investigation speaks to the book's procedural elements: Raphael Kadir moves between FBI field offices, interrogation rooms, and crime scenes with the kind of operational detail that suggests research rather than invention. ## Books Like The Da Vinci Code With a Catholic Protagonist For readers who have been through Dan Brown's Robert Langdon series and are looking for books like The Da Vinci Code, Sorrowful Mysteries covers adjacent territory: Catholic Church politics, secret military orders, ancient relics, coded letters, and a conspiracy that reaches from small-town Virginia to the Vatican. The overlap is genuine, and Folsey's comparison is not unreasonable. The distinction is structural. Brown's protagonist is a symbologist, an academic outsider piecing together clues. Anthony's protagonist is a priest embedded in the institution itself, sworn to defend it, and facing enemies who share his faith and, in several cases, his arguments. The moral territory is less clean as a result. Raphael kills members of DOR throughout the novel, and the book does not shy away from the tension between his priestly vows and his operational mandate. The book also reaches further than Brown into actual Catholic doctrine. The Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary, which give the novel its title, structure the thematic arc: the Agony in the Garden, the Scourging at the Pillar, the Crowning with Thorns, the Carrying of the Cross, and the Crucifixion. Each mystery corresponds to a phase of Raphael's investigation, and a missing relic connected to one of them drives the plot toward Nova Scotia. **About Anthony P. Jones** Thriller Author Anthony P. Jones is a Virginia-based thriller author and former Morgan Stanley stockbroker. Born in Kenbridge, Virginia, he was the first Black broker hired by Morgan Stanley in Nashville, Tennessee, and later in Richmond, Virginia, where he spent 15 years in finance before leaving to write full-time. Diagnosed with dyslexia at 35, he enrolled in creative writing courses at the University of Virginia. He has published four novels: Operation Smokeout, Red States, D8 With F8, and Sorrowful Mysteries, a Catholic thriller published by Palmetto Publishing in 2026 that the late Hollywood producer George Folsey Jr. called The Da Vinci Code on steroids. He has said he has 11 more completed manuscripts ready for publication. [Website](https://anthonypjones.com) ## FAQ **Q: What is the greatest mystery in the Catholic Church?** The Catholic Church has several long-running mysteries, from the contents of the Vatican Secret Archives to unsettled questions about the deaths of certain popes. In fiction, authors commonly draw on the debate over priestly celibacy, the fate of relics from Christ's crucifixion, and the relationship between the Church and military orders such as the Knights Templar. **Q: What are some of the best religious thrillers to read?** Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code remains the highest-selling religious thriller. Steve Berry, James Rollins, and Raymond Khoury have all written in the genre. Anthony P. Jones's Sorrowful Mysteries, published in 2026, was called "The Da Vinci Code on steroids" by the late Hollywood producer George Folsey Jr. **Q: Who are some must-read Black thriller authors?** Walter Mosley, Attica Locke, Rachel Howzell Hall, and Kellye Garrett are among the most widely read. Anthony P. Jones, a Virginia-based author and former Morgan Stanley stockbroker, has published four thrillers, the latest being Sorrowful Mysteries. **Q: Is the Oak Island treasure story based on real history?** Oak Island in Nova Scotia has been the subject of treasure-hunting expeditions since 1795. The site's connection to the Knights Templar is speculative but widely discussed. The History Channel's Curse of Oak Island follows modern excavation efforts. Anthony P. Jones's Sorrowful Mysteries uses the Oak Island legend as a major plot element, fictionalizing the theory that Templar wealth from the Temple of Jerusalem is buried there.