Mount Athos, the ancient land of monasteries in Greece, is sacred to Orthodox believers. But the breathtakingly beautiful "Holy Mountain" has a darker side, which Father Nectarios reveals in his account of a lifetime spent in this unique remnant of Byzantium. Fleeing from creditors after his boat is wrecked off Crete, the hedonistic young Englishman submits to absolute obedience to his doomed abbot, whose relics help him face both inner and outer conflicts. The reader encounters every class of monk and pilgrim in this medieval microcosm: the saintly and the ambitious; fanatics and rogues; ascetics and sycophants; erudites and bumpkins; scroungers and plutocrats. The future of this Christian Tibet is even stranger than its past. This is an adventure story in which the sensual blends with the spiritual in an unmistakable atmosphere of authenticity. The author was once a novice on Mount Athos.