Rating: 
Summary: Hardy Boys for adults
Review: A comparison of this novel with the Hardy Boys is meant to be descriptive, not pejorative. When I was 10 or 11 years old I used to love diving into a new Hardy Boys mystery and it was with some regret that when I reached the age of 13 the books no longer worked for me. (The regret lasted only until I discovered Science Fiction -Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke, Simak, Norton, etc.) Starting with the colourful cover, the Hardy Boys porovided action, mystery, suspense -these were juveniles succeeding in an adult world. My God, they could even drive! And imagine having a father who was a detective. I would lose myself for hours in their black and white world of smart, energetic teen-agers and bad guys with foreign accents and five o'clock shadows.'The Da Vinci Code' is the second Dan Brown book I have read (I read 'Angels and Demons' last year.) Both books are packed with fascinating, little known facts and interesting, if far out, theories about intriguing subjects. The writing is clunky, even risible in places. The characters are one dimensional and absolutely cartoonish at times. The plot twists are outrageous, occasionally bordering on the ridiculous. The action is breakneck and nobody in a Dan Brown book seems to ever sleep. And yet it all works in its own way. Here are some negatives that a potential reader might want to know about: -paper-thin, cliched characters.
-barely readable writing style -I've never read a book where so many people 'chuckled' or where jaws were so prone to dropping.
-grandiose, Agatha Christie-like plot turns.
-loose, somewhat unsatisfying ending -perhaps setting things up for a sequel. On the positive side: -interesting, surprising facts about all sorts of things (e.g. Christ's divinity was voted upon at the First Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. Until then a majority of Christians thought of Christ as a divinely inspired prophet, but still a human being.) Brown stimulates thought on any number of intriguing topics. He challenges what you thought you knew while providing fascinating snippets of new information. Some of this information seems to be stretched and sensationalized at times, but I don't think there are any fabrications or any intent to mislead.
-well-described, exotic European buildings and locations. Brown is at his best describing ancient buildings and famous works of art.
-furious action and multiple points of view.
-there is no padding. Some writers would have dragged out this book for another 200 pages.
-there is violence but no gratuitous violence. There is no sex, gratuitous or otherwise, which I suppose could have also have been listed as a negative. Nevertheless it is refreshing to read a best-selling author who doesn't feel he has to put in a minimum quota of sex to fulfill a mundane expectation.
-reading 'The Da Vinci Code' makes you want to travel and see the art and locations described within. Brwon speculates a lot, but with the topics under consideration there is a lot of room for speculation. Hard, uncontestable facts about early Christianity, the Templars, medieval secret societies, and the inner intrigues of the Catholic church are not easy to come by. Brown does his readers a service by questioning long accepted ideas and challenging one to re-examine what you thought you knew about the rise of Christianity. The idea that the Roman Empire didn't really fall but only morphed into the monolithic, imperialistic Catholic Church is not new (see P.K. Dick's 'Valis') but it is an important concept that deserves more consideration, and it will be a new idea to a lot of Brown's huge readership. The fact that the four gospels, which so many Christians take for the last word about events that happened 2000 years ago, were only a small fraction of what was extant at the time the 'authorized version' was approved about 1700 years ago will also be new to many readers (read 'The Unauthorized Version' by Robin Lane Fox), as will the role of the Catholic church in deliberately suppressing all points of view not in strict accordance with its rigid dogma. It wasn't just millions of people who were tortured, slaughtered, and erased from history when the Manichaeans, Gnostics, Bogomils, Cathars and so-called witches were wiped out, it was also ideas that were killed. Often the only way facts about some of these ideas, movements, and people can be reconstituted is by studying extant church polemics against them (see 'Encyclopedia of Heresies and Heretics' by Leonard George.) While far from being a work of art, 'The Da Vinci Code' is a good bit of escapist fun which touches on important questions of history and theology, and I look forward to reading Brown's next book.
Rating: 
Summary: A Thrilling Read from Start to Finish
Review: In his breakthrough novel, Dan Brown re-introduces the reader to Robert Langdon, an expert from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Brown stays true to form in this gripping read - you won't want to put this book down! "The Da Vinci Code" is full of rapid-fire surprises that are likely to leave one breathless, as the crew risks their lives in search of the Holy Grail. Brown's remarkably surrealistic work of fiction is literally teeming with fascinating anecdotes - which leave the reader shocked, stunned, and enthralled. http://www.stephenhehn.com
Rating: 
Summary: This is literature?
Review: I don't often buy books, but I bought "The Da Vinci Code" on the recommendation of more than one good friend. I'll start with the good stuff: Even if not entirely factual, Dan Brown's theories about the female's role in Christianity are intriguing and thought-provoking.
However, the book itself, which makes a lame attempt at conveying these theories, is not even remotely intriguing. Brown's writing style is trite, clunky, and a disgrace to what we call modern "literature." It took me an unusually long time to get through this book because I kept putting it down after only four or five pages at a time, thinking how incredible it was that such tedious writing could make it through the editorial process. I am equally astounded by the number of people who read this book and who are so quick to call it "engaging, thrilling, wonderful, and the best book ever" in their reviews. Perhaps in the hands of a more talented author, this book would have been worthwhile. As it stands, though, the [money] I forked over for this could have easily been better spent going to see a couple of mindless and yet much more entertaining movies. This is the WORST BOOK EVER, and if you liked it, well, quite honestly, you make me sad...
Rating: 
Summary: Comic Book for Adults
Review: This author loves number riddles and in this book he adroitly discovers the lowest common denominator. But what's more important, how many books Dan Brown sells or the legacy of great individuals? (He should be imprisoned for what he did to Bernini in Angels and Demons - but, heh, heh, not too many lawyers around representing 17th century sculptors) This is Spiderman in the Louvre, Batman gallavanting around Europe. The plot is intricate and the background semi-interesting, but the characters are flat and the dialogue laughable. And the author REALLY needs to fess up in his little "Fact" sections as to what's not real regarding important historical figures. Can anyone name an Oliver Stone movie since JFK? Coming soon to a theater near you, America!
Rating:
Summary: Interesting but has its faults
Review: When I first started to read this book, I was riveted. I could not put this book down. I loved trying to solve the riddles and all of the adventure. Now that I've said the good, it's time for the bad. This book would gather some momentum and then just stops for long periods at a time to give long "lecttures." I felt that this book,though filled with interesting information, had way too much reasearch in it, which made it seem to go on and on. If you can handle it, go on and read it in one sitting; if not, take your time.
Rating:
Summary: What's all the fuss about?
Review: The Da Vinci Code has dominated the NYT best-seller list for weeks and weeks, but it's a little hard to see why. Yes, it's entertaining. But I find cloaking the mystery in a pseudo-intellectual romp through art history and church history a little tedious (the inaccuracies have rightly been pointed out). More to the point--and what I haven't seen mentioned in other Amazon reviews--is that the writing is labored, contrived, and frequently cliche-ridden. There are far too many cliff-hangers; the device becomes tiresome. As a puzzle, I found the book more maddening than fun. At one point, two quite intelligent characters are utterly bamboozled by something I saw immediately, and that wasn't so surprising in a book whose backdrop is Leonardo da Vinci (I won't say more in case you read this book yourself).
The tale is too complex, and so it bogs down. It's not surprising that people find the ending a bit of a let-down; Brown writes himself into a terrible corner with not much of a way to get out.
Perhaps the appeal is the idea that "people who know" are keeping things from us: sooner or later, we're all attracted to a good conspiracy. Those who read this book and forget that the work is ENTIRELY fiction are not all to blame: the story is couched in believable--if preposterous--terms. But don't be fooled. There is very little genuine history here. Leonardo did write backwards in his notebooks, and the Mona Lisa is an intriguing painting (speculation about its subject has been rampant all through art history). There was a Priory of Sion and Templar Knights, and Opus Dei and the Catholic Church are of course real. The rest is pretty much the work of the author's imagination.
Read it for fun--if you don't start getting an aneurism from all the cliff-hangers--but don't think you're reading serious symbology, iconography, art history, or any truth about ancient secret societies. And if you must read it, borrow a copy from the library or from a friend who's through with it. Everyone has made enough money off of this bunkum for now.
Rating:
Summary: A delightful novel
Review: Robert Langdon, a Harvard symbologist, receives an urgent phone call while staying in Paris. The police contact him regarding the murder of Jacques Saunière, curator of the Louvre, who, before dying, leaves a series of clues hidden in Da Vinci's works for Langdon and Sophie Neveu, a French cryptologist, to find. Together they piece the clues to reveal the secret left behind by Saunière. However, seeing Langdon's name written out at the scene of the crime by the victim himself makes him the prime suspect in the murder investigation. The novel is well written in general and filled with fascinating information about Da Vinci and the Priory of Sion. Whether these details are accurate or not, I wouldn't know, but they make for such a fascinating backdrop to the story that I didn't care. I wanted to believe it was true. But this might keep purists or serious art buffs from getting into the art world described by the author. Dan Brown has written a very entertaining novel and, after having read it, I understand why it has been on the Top 10 list for over 40 weeks. Some of the story lines are quite predictable and you will see the inevitable pages before the author gets to it, but luckily none of these elements are part of the main storyline. I can't recommend this book enough.
Rating: 
Summary: clearing things
Review: just so you know I could not understand a word mack was saying I am nowhere near racist so don't judge people on their own point of view. that is being racist.
Rating:
Summary: OVER REACTORS NEED NOT APPLY...
Review: I picked up this book one day not ever knowing what it was about or what people thought of it before. From the moment i picked it up i couldn't put it down. It was grasping my imagination to see these paintings as something else. I don't believe that any of it was true, but it was some body elses imagination at work. This book was nicely done. All these other people who look to into it to see that it's fiction and that it's not real need to calm down. Just cause things in here are not accurate does not mean it was not a good book. Not just a good book, an excellent book. I recommend it to everyone who loves to read those types of books that you just can't put down.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Read
Review: I found this a great treat. It is not the my typical genre, so if you are looking for a change, this is wonderful. Once I started this mystery, I could not put it down.
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