Rating: 
Summary: A Wonderfull book
Review: Are you satisfied when you find a book that join history, adventure, mistery and an intelligent dose of esoterism? If true Foucault's Pendulum is your book The Eco's erudition is here an atractive component, even more than The Name of the Rose where Eco was a little more dense. In Foucault's Pendulum all is fun, even the more philosophical parts (less evident here). When you have a limited time to read, you have to select very carefully your readings. Foucault's Pendulum is a really good alternative.
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Summary: The Conspiracy Theory
Review: This book is one of the best fiction books I've read. Readers have complained that the book is too complicated and hard to read, but consider this before you side with their criticism. Foucault's Pendulum is a not just a story, but a story grounded in our world to a great extent. The characters in the story set out to create The Conspiracy Theory, one which will rival all those theories created by the credulous. These three men set out to explain everything from Jesus, the Rosicrucians, and Foucault's Pendulum. For those with some knowledge of history, the exposure to mystical interpretations of history will provide not only entertainment, but actual knowledge about history.In addition to the great historical component to this novel, Eco creates characters that are eccentric, yet believable. His characters are not two-dimensional, but all contain a depth which Eco explores in detail. Read this book!
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Summary: I Liked It?
Review: I like to think that I am an intelligent human being, but after reading this book, I feel like I do not know anything. I enjoyed the concept of the book, and the story involved, and did recognize some of the fun Eco was having with history, but I guess I have a heck of a lot more to learn. As someone always searching, I did find endearing the overall idea that was conveyed to me: We may not recognize the best life offers us until it is too late.
Rating: 
Summary: Too complicated, Too long
Review: I decided to try this book because this book came highly recommended, I battled my way through 300 pages, and at no time did I enjoy the book. Reading it became more like a chore than an enjoyment so I gave up. The book is full of obscure historical references, people, events and places. And to understand the significance of these events one would have to be an expert on the last one thousand years of European history. The language was too complicated and academic, and the book was about 200 pages too long. Just when I thought an ineteresting scene was developing, the main character goes off to Brazil, and wastes a couple of dozen pages undergoing some cultural experience, whose meaning was lost to me. I'm not saying this is a bad book, because I could see that for someone who can follow it and understand it they could get a lot out of it, but be warned potential readers THIS IS ONE TOUGH READ, if you feel up to it get the book, if you have your doubts don't waste the money.
Rating:
Summary: A very unusual, deep book
Review: I read this book without an unabridged dictionary, and had no problems with it. I think the problem that some people have with Eco is that he is a very educated man, and if I'm not mistaken, he's also a university professor. I'm sure that this may make his works hard to understand sometimes, but what I like about him is that he treats his audience like they have intelligence. He doesn't dumb down his works because he doesn't feel the need to, though I'm sure it would make him more understood if he did. Having said that, I found this book to be very unusual. The characters are radically different than the ones in The Name of the Rose, which is the only other book of his I've read so far. Although all of these men are highly educated, they all have different, unique personalities. I also like how this book addresses the issue of the Knights Templar, and how there are so many people out there that seem to have "a theory" on what the Knights were doing, or what they had "discovered". I wouldn't be surprised if Holy Blood, Holy Grail was an influence, but while those authors call their "discoveries" fact, Eco at least has the good sense to call his work fiction. The Knights Templar has long been an interest of mine, and I think it helps somewhat to know a little about the Templars, but for the most part Eco has presented much of what he's talking about in the course of the book, as the characters discover new information to create their theory--which, of course, they claim is made up, but unfortunately others take them seriously. I can't help but notice how the Knight's Templar fanatics (you know, the ones that claim they're carrying on the tradition) in his tale take everything so darn seriously. One of them even states, "These men know more about us than we do ourselves." I don't know about anyone else, but to me that signals there's a problem--that these fanatics really don't know anything about what they claim to uphold. I was wondering if Eco was making a subtle commentary about these people and their claims that their discoveries are "Fact" when they should more likely be categorized in the realm of "Fiction". At the end of the book Eco seems to claim, or is claiming, that there are no mysteries in the "mystery societies". I guess the real mystery then is why these things still exist. This book is about more than the Knights Templar, though. It seems to bring in just about a little bit of everything. If I recall correctly, it even has some of the Kabbalah in it, as well as the ideas behind lei lines and the use of secret codes. This book mixes humor in many unexpected places. I thought this book was going to be serious all the way through, but couldn't help but notice that it had me laughing in a number of places. It also goes into the lives of the characters fairly deeply, especially the main character, and I found these characters fairly well fleshed out. I would have liked it if the chapters that had excerpts from other books be translated. I haven't a clue what most of them are, or what they say. I can't honestly say it detracted from my enjoyment of the book enough for it to be considered an issue, but I suppose my curiosity had the better of me and I wondered what those excerpts said. I can't really comment on how important they would be for my understanding of the book, but since I feel like I understood it very well, the excerpts may not be all that important. I remember when I read this book it had a very profound impact on me, but for the life of me I don't remember what it was. This probably is due to the fact that the impact was very subtle, but profound. I know it's pretty much changed my life in a spiritual sense in a very permanent way. I don't think this book is for everyone--a friend of mine was very unimpressed with it--but I would have to say that it was a very enjoyeable book for me. I like deep plots, and this book has a very deep one.
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Summary: Vanity Press is dangerous
Review: I was in this story...running and hiding and discovering. It pulled me in and kept me there. I have read the book a total of three times over the years and each time I find the whole thing so new. The desire for the secrets of the Knights Templar and the RoseyCross sects are so engaging. I had a wonderful time in this book. It is like going on vacation with the characters, not a sane vacation, but a vacation. The realm of vanity press offices around the world are in fear of ever trangressing their customers beliefs again, for fear the absurd may be real.
Rating:
Summary: amazing
Review: It's an amazing book...kind of intense but very deep. It's a work of art.
Rating:
Summary: A monster
Review: This is a thought-provoking thriller. The plot on its own has enough twists and turns to at least keep one up at night, if not mess with one's head. The thought-provoking aspect is most interesting to me. What are rumors? What is myth? What is knowledge? Can we have any knowledge? Is knowledge a good thing? When does fiction affect reality? These are important questions that the book brings up in my mind. There are the arcana of esotericism and hermeticism, the real intrigue is in how this corresponds to the way humanity has built civilization.
Rating:
Summary: ...
Review: Eco's main character, Casaubon, is also named after Issac Casaubon, who in 1614 dated Hermetic writings as Christian-era works, thereby single-handedly bringing an end to the Renaissance Magus. Eco wants to have the same dampening effect on his reader's enthusiasm for the esoteric. His plot is largley cribbed from Blavatsky, and much of it reads like a carelessly assembled collection of encyclopedia entries. There are huge passages of exposition, and the characters are roughly sketched. He couldn't have trivialized women more, leaving them brief cameos where they assume the role of virgin/... or child chalice. Other cliches include non-sequitur droppings from Finnegan's Wake and the Odyssey, in case you weren't impressed by his untranslated blurbs from arcane sources. By the end, he mentions Sam Spade on practically every page. Ultimately, it looks like the book is an excuse for the author to break out with his tired WWII stories. Eco's characters reminisce against the background of civil unrest in the 60s and spiritual awakening in the 70s, and he pits his lost generation against those born after after the war, insisting that even a cowardly kid ducking Fascists is a better character than those braving the barricades a generation later in Paris. As for the history, it's not that difficult to follow, but it's not worth the effort. Eco even tires of it by the end and wraps up his story with an insufferable bit of moralizing and nostalgia. If you want a pop tale interwoven with conspiracy and esoterica, read the Illuminatus Trilogy instead.
Rating:
Summary: Absorbing, maddening, fulfilling.
Review: Once I got past the mental masturbation of following the references and the connections, I was struck by the borrowed movements found in other works of great importance. The cave in Italy, the witches in the field, borrowing other Walpurgis Night imagery - the entire work touched undercurrents that run rampant in Euro-Judeo-Christian culture. However the greatest accomplishment of the work was the way in which I deeply wanted to identify with Causabon, but in the end found myself one of the Diabolicals that the book in many ways satirizes. The gist of this work is that the Diabolical and the religious are in fact one, and Eco's own secular humanism is the true way, albeit doomed to the cross.
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