The title was appealing so I bought this book, hoping it would contain a lot of interesting information on ancient religions and civilisations but I almost gave up reading after a few pages. The illustrations are very nice but William Henry's interpretation is pure fantasy. He starts by describing a building in Nashville and then links it to all kinds of places, including Mount Meru...The worst is really his new version of linguistics: he interprets all kinds of Sumerian, Indian, Hebrew words according to...English. He links the Egyptian god Amon to the Greek god Hermes, because the names sound similar (??). The word stone is a pun for tone, which sounds like Aton.
Let me quote another example: "Mister in English is a word play on mist, the Egyptian name for the dew or wisdom of the pillar of Osiris that rains like manna wisdom upon the initiate...Mari holds her Kaduceus Rod, Baton or Wand of Mari-cury or Meru-cury in her hand. This ancient Marie Curie wears her blue stones that cause IL, illumination. With her Cloak of the Illuminati snuggly fitting her body, Mari goes to her sheepfold (folding ship), which is the center of nature of Sumer (or Su-Meru)." Here he links the Christian Mary to Ishtar whose statue was found in the ruins of Mari.
Another example: according to him Languedoc, the region of France that was the Cathars'home and which means Language of Oc, comes from occamy, a corruption of alchemy (sounds like the English pronunciation in phonetics to me, not the French one!). Sorry but oc is an old local version of oui(yes in French)in the south and the name was used to distinguish the south from the north where they spoke the Language of Oi, which later became the French oui we use nowadays. In southern dialects oc is still used to say yes.
I still wonder what this cloak of the Illuminati is but one thing is sure: the book is very misleading and pure fantasy. I gave it 2 stars for the entertainment value.