Rating: 
Summary: love the ideas, but the story fails...
Review: I rarely read books with so much media hype surrounding them, but the premise of this book piqued my interest. As an art lover and a spiritual person, I was looking forward to an interesting read.I was incredibly disappointed. I hope no one finds offense in this next statement, but this book was written for the masses. The writing is... obvious. No thinking required. It's a good book to take on vacation, or to read while on break from grad school, like I am. It is not an intellectual endeavor, by any means! With that said, it was certainly entertaining, and I'm wondering if the movie is already in the works. Robert Langdon is likened to Harrison Ford early in the story, and I don't think this was an accident. The reader is stuck with the mental image of Ford as Langdon. (not such a bad thing, of course, but it adds to the Hollywood movie feel of the book!) The potential in this book is endless, and I believe it could have been a masterpiece. Sadly, the claims on the jacket are simply hype... Nelson DeMille claims the work of "pure genius" lies within the pages of this book, but I fail to see it! Every single symbol is explained and explained again, in case you forgot the first explanation. This certainly takes the fun out of symbolism, if you ask me. Every chapter is written with this cliffhanger, Hollywood-esque style, which keeps you turning pages in the beginning but gets tiresome after a while. I love the theories surrounding the Holy Grail and Mary Magdalene, and I find the beliefs in the sacred feminine incredibly intriguing. I find it funny when devout Roman Catholics denounce this fictional book as heresy... these closed-minded reviews just add to the controversy and help support opposing theories. In my opinion, Roman Catholicism is the nuttiest and most corrupt religion out there. More people should examine the ancient beliefs in the sacred feminine, something that has been sadly eradicated from the Catholic Church. This idealogy is explored in The da Vinci Code, and I found the history quite interesting. One last thing, in response to some of the reviews I've read - it's difficult to take people's reviews seriously when they can't even keep the story straight. Sophie Neveu was Sauniere's granddaughter in the book, not his daughter, as I have read too many people say. It's an important detail, as the reader finds at the very end of the story. Speaking of the end, that was my favorite part of the book. I saw it coming and was annoyed to have the writer present it as such an amazing revelation, but Sophie's reunion with her family members help tie the story together and add a little depth to otherwise incredibly shallow characters. The end was also my favorite part of the book because, well, I could finally stop reading it! Throughout the story, I kept waiting for Brown to redeem himself as a writer but it never happened. All in all, I feel it could have been a great book but it was mediocre at best. Some of the historical stories and symbols have grabbed my attention though, and I look forward to reading more about these intriguing topics.
Rating: 
Summary: An Exciting Read...but don't take it seriously.
Review: I rarely read fiction. But a friend of mine dropped off this book and asked me for my opinion of it. Probably because as a scientist I have a strong interest in numbers and codes as well as in religion. I enjoyed the book very much. Not for its possible relation to fact, but because I detected the hand of an author who had his finger solidly on the pulse of the not-too-critical reading public. They just want a good read...all how-many millions of them. The book kept me leaping from chapter to chapter (they are short, typically four pages long), wondering how the heros were going to escape from their latest predicament. I thought the escapes were clever and imaginative, but then I am not a hardened detective story reader. My deepest quandry was not in how seriously to take the basic theme of the story: that Jesus had recovered from the cruxification and had descendents with Mary Magdelane in France. I would say that the probability is in the low sub-sub-digits, much less than 1%. What Dan Brown has done is to confuse what few historical facts I have in my posession with his well-thought-out revisionist thoughts. In a few years, maybe even tomorrow, I will have trouble separating my spare knowledge of the facts from his pregnant presentation of imaginative events. That aspect I don't like. It is for this very reason that I do not watch so-called TV and movie docum-dramas of events in recent history. I have lived through all the wars since 1940. I have watched controversial political figures come and go. These "facts" are still in my head, although fading. When an imaginative "artist", Oliver Stone, for example, replays history but imposes his personal twist on the "facts", I am at a loss whether to be entertained or ill-informed. So I have made it my deliberate policy not to watch docu-dramas. The same with this book. Read as entertainment, it moves as fast and is more exciting than a James Bond movie, because you can skip through the parts that do not interest you. But beware of cluttering your mind with unproven, even if plausible, theories. Before long they may sit in your mind as established facts. For that reason, you may deliberately choose not to read it. But being forewarned is thus forearmed. If you read this book and you will be able to participate in the innumerable stimulating discussions it has engendered. I am enjoying that activity now. Jesus is by far the most influential person who has trod the planet Earth, judging by the establishment that even today thrives based on his memory. Well-intentioned men, and some not so well-intentioned, have written revisionist themes about his life since its beginning. It is very easy to perceive what Jesus taught, but very difficult to follow his teachings. This book does not help this aspect at all, but at least it turns a spotlight back on the absorbing and intriguing mystery that is Jesus.
Rating:
Summary: fun fun fun!
Review: I rather liked the book. I read it in one night. night/morning. But the ending was rather...cliche or used too often. the ending is very corny and trashy. i don't like it at all. but the plot was pretty good and fast paced.
Rating: 
Summary: Not as lame as Angels and Demons, but not up to the hype
Review: I read "Angels and Demons" first, and it has a plot hole you can drive truck through - at least this book is better. For some reason this book has a "buzz" about it - I think some folks think this is based on facts. If you read it as light fiction, it is OK. Anyone paying much attention will easily figure out who "teacher" is LONG before the characters in the book. Get it from the library or wait for the paperback. Dennis
Rating:
Summary: A Pulp Page Turner
Review: I read "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" years ago, and liked it so much that I toured the Languedoc region of France, so I was very familiar with the theme of "The Da Vinci Code". I noticed that Jacques Sauniere shares the same surname as the priest of Rennes-le-Chateau---not a coincidence, I'm sure. Brown has written an engrossing novel, but his style is more pulp than poetic, and the characters, for all their collective expertise, are a bit slow on the uptake. That said, I really enjoyed the book, and it's nice to see the Goddess get her due on the New York Times Best Seller list.
Rating: 
Summary: Brilliant story, impressive research
Review: I read 'The Da Vinci Code' from cover to cover in two days - it was absolutely riveting! Beside being an exciting story, I also loved the details on ancient symbolisms, religious overtones, mathematical tidbits (e.g. phi) and settings in one of my favourite cities, Paris. Kudos to Dan Brown!
Rating:
Summary: Great book; couldn¿t put it down
Review: I read 2 good books recently; I couldn't put either down. One fiction, one non-fiction. This, obviously, is the great work of fiction; the great work of non-fiction is Make Every Girl Want You by John Fate and Steve Reil. Dan Brown's book had me mesmerized. I love the way art, another passion of mine, is intertwined in this novel. Mr. Brown is a genius the way he developed "hidden" clues in the work of Mr. Da Vinci! Clues that anyone could hypothetically see, but hidden by Da Vinci. I also am a religious man, and love how Brown weaved Jesus, Mary, and the holy grail throughout the book. The book was a fast read, and I couldn't put it down. Excellent combination of religion, suspense, & mystery! Kudos to Dan Brown!
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating!
Review: I read a brief excerpt from this book on a book site and it seemed slow and plodding, so didn't follow up and order it. A friend recommended I give it another try and I am so glad I did. This is a fascinating read - full of historical detail concerning Christianity and the Catholic Church. I loved the explanations behind Da Vinci's religious paintings and the information concerning the Knights of Templar and Priory of Sion and their connection to the Holy Grail. We have been passing this book around in my family and it's motivated some really interesting topics of discussion.
Rating:
Summary: By far the best book I've read in years
Review: I read a lot - and this is by far the most interesting book I've read in years. The action is paced well, the historical information is accurate and the plot stand up well. There is so much going on and you're thinking about everything that for once the ending really was a surprise.
From a pure literary sense, this book falls down. The dialogue is clumsy at times and the writing seems forced. Give it 3/5 as a literary book and record it as the only flaw. That probably keeps it from being a perfect 5/5 for me overall.
There are people who won't like the subject matter. I will warn you that it deals with religion and lightly questions a lot of what you "know" is true. Apparently the author believes a good deal of what he writes, but even a crackpot can tell an entertaining story. I don't think this book is going to be creating the religious firestorm that other reviews have hacked it for.
Rating: 
Summary: Trash history, mediocre writing and a good guessing game
Review: I read all of it because Mr. Brown clearly knows how to tell a suspenseful story. His vocabulary and grammar lead thoughtful readers to conclude that he doesn't write especially well, and some editor might have improved this book's tedious composition. His ill-spun history of early Christianity is ludicrous. If fiction of this sort aspires to be credible in some way beyond the story itself -- and Mr. Brown clearly believes his does -- then we must conclude that this novel is not credible. It's especially galling, in this tale about recovering feminine wisdom, that its principal woman character becomes a cypher for knowledgeable men. Was it beyond the reach of Mr. Brown's imagination for the protagonist to have been a woman? Let's hope that his next book shows more craft, better research and a smidgen of insight into the nature of his own story.
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