The Da Vinci Code

Rating:
Summary: Who wrote this stuff?
Review: It is amazing to me that this book is a number one best seller. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, when murderers of the language like Tom Clancy and John Grisham can be at the top of the list. The writing in this book is TERRIBLE. Although the intellectual puzzles posed are interesting, it is completely implausible that characters under such stress, lack of sleep, etc. could suddenly have the solutions to these puzzles dawn on them. In addition, the plot has more deus ex machina moments than the entire history of Greek theater. Very disappointing, and not even a good read.

Rating:
Summary: some flaws
Review: it is indeed interesting one. although dan brown maybe use too often the knack of suspense. at the ending of many chapters he presents the surprise and cut. it is not a bad knack, but too often.
well, some flaws here. first, does the author determine which month the story happened? one place it said it is April, and near end it becomes november. second, why did Fache let robert longden go to the rest room without escort him? even with monitor, it is so un-professional. Third, after two trivial one, there is a big blow, why did the sibling of jesus and mary have to flee to england that time? because that time, according to the book, desciples treated jeses as prophet. until two hundred and some years later, when emporor constante tried to change the image of jesus as god, well, again according to the book, then there was danger for all offsprings of jesus to be eliminated. so why two hundreds and some years before, the daughter of jesus had to escape to england? besides, two hundred years is a long time for having offspring. it could be seven generations there. well, it is a fiction only, an interesting one.

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Summary: Kind of Hard To Believe It's Fake...
Review: It is one a.m. You just got into bed a few hours ago. Suddenly the phone rings, and the hotel worker tells you that someone's on their way to your room. When the visitor gets to your hotel room, you discover that he is with the police. But what would they want with you? You've done nothing wrong. You're a college teacher for crying out loud! You teach art and symbolism, and have been writing books on your research. Jacques Sauniere, the head curator at the Louvre in France, had arranged for you to meet up with him somewhere, but he never showed. The policeman shows you a picture from a crime scene. The photo is of a body. Jacques Sauniere's body. He then invites you to the Louvre to help with the crime scene. But helping isn't really what you're there for. You are being questioned without even knowing it! The head of the police, Fache, is in charge of this case. He is determined to find you guilty in order to help support his job, being as he's currently in low esteem with French and American law keepers. Sophie Neveu , a cryptologist, meets up with you and Fache. She says she has a message from the U.S. Embassy for you, but when you listen to the message, you find that it is something much more important. It is up to you, Mr. Robert Langdon, to team up with Sophie Neveu and investigate Jacques Sauniere's death, find the keystone to the Holy Grail, while at the same time protecting the keystone, avoiding arrest by Fache, and keeping the evil Opus Dei from power.

"The Da Vinci Code" by Dan Brown is a wonderfully written book. It is very relaxing, even in the fast sections. Although the book takes place in a 24 hour period, it seems to be much longer. Mr. Brown has a great knowledge of symbolism and history. As the little reviews on the flaps of the book say, the book is "pure genius!" Most of the clues in the story revolve around Leonardo Da Vinci, thus the name "The Da Vinci Code." In the book, the murdered curator Jacques Sauniere was part of a group called "The Priory of Sion," or P.S. The group is revolved around the "sacred feminine," worship female goddesses of fertility, and are the keepers of the Holy Grail. Opus Dei is one of the groups after the Holy Grail. Bishop Aringarosa is in charge of Opus Dei, and has been trying to get his hands on the Holy Grail in order to use it to boost his power. His assistant, Silas, does all the dirty work. ... This book refers to a lot of history and paintings, along with the Bible; although a lot of it is made up. Don't take it seriously, it's just amusing. This 454 book was worth the read, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it too. If the books you read need to be fast-paced, then I do not recommend "The Da Vinci Code."rtistic than Fabergé' ! than 'assorted cloissoné artisans' ! Did you know that ? I didn't know that ! I still don't know that ! There's lots more 'wisdom' on this victim, be warned.

Not only does he relentlessly bungle his facts and couple them with unfounded and preposterous social commentary, he has the nerve to insert this comment, about a film : "Sadly the filmmakers had gotten most of the specifics wrong..." And if the reader is not sufficiently impressed with Mr. Brown yet, they get one more clue, by including this esteemed opinion on the supposed creator of the mystery: "...he was a frighteningly clever man." Where does it end ! On page 484, directly before the blessedly blank flyleaf, where I breathe a sigh of relief of not only being done with this bestselling drivel, but that my name is not defiled by being included in the acknowledgments. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition

Rating:
Summary: Book with an agenda!
Review: It is poorly written, atrociously researched mess although the author claims are facts. But despite Brown's scholarly airs, a writer who thinks the Merovingians founded Paris and forgets that the popes once lived in Avignon is hardly a model researcher. And for him to state that the Church burned five million women as witches shows a willful-and malicious-ignorance of the historical record. The latest figures for deaths during the European witch craze are between 30,000 to 50,000 victims. Not all were executed by the Church, not all were women, and not all were burned. Brown's claim that educated women, priestesses, and midwives were singled out by witch-hunters is not only false, it betrays his goddess-friendly sources. So error-laden is The Da Vinci Code that the educated reader actually applauds those rare occasions where Brown stumbles (despite himself) into the truth. A few examples of his "impeccable" research: He claims that the motions of the planet Venus trace a pentacle (the so-called Ishtar pentagram) symbolizing the goddess. But it isn't a perfect figure and has nothing to do with the length of the Olympiad. The ancient Olympic games were celebrated in honor of Zeus Olympias, not Aphrodite, and occurred every four years. If the above seems like a pile driver applied to a gnat, the blows are necessary to demonstrate the utter falseness of Brown's material. His willful distortions of documented history are more than matched by his outlandish claims about controversial subjects. But to a postmodernist, one construct of reality is as good as any other. Brown's approach seems to consist of grabbing large chunks of his stated sources and tossing them together in a salad of a story.
Read http://www.crisismagazine.com/feature1.htm
The Da Vinci Code takes esoterica mainstream. It may well do for Gnosticism what The Mists of Avalon did for paganism-gain it popular acceptance. After all, how many lay readers will see the blazing inaccuracies put forward as buried truths?
What's more, in making phony claims of scholarship, Brown's book infects readers with a virulent hostility toward Catholicism. Dozens of occult history books, conveniently cross-linked by Amazon.com, are following in its wake. And booksellers' shelves now bulge with falsehoods few would be buying without The Da Vinci Code connection. While Brown's assault on the Catholic Church may be a backhanded compliment, it's one we would have happily done without.

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Summary: How is This Book a Bestseller?
Review: It is remarkable to me how the success of "The Da Vinci Code" has catapulted Dan Brown's career. It has caused his previous under read works to hit bestsellerdom years after first being published. And as a matter of fact, it was based solely on this book's significantly long ride at the top of the New York Times Bestseller list that finally (after nearly a year) convinced me (against my better judgment) to see what all the interest was about. And to my deep disappointment (not in Dan Brown but rather in the seemingly abhorrent taste in fiction that pervades our culture and has been cemented by pitiful works of fiction such as this one) this novel is little more than a fictional account of some historical research, dragged along for 450+ pages with extremely bad prose, truly one-dimensional characters, and what can only be considered barely plausible action. If you want to read a good book (one that is actually written well, has good characterization, and a meaningful and plausible plot) then please, please do NOT read "The Da Vinci Code".

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Summary: DAVINCI CODE RIGHT IN THAT NICEA DIDN'T END CONTROVERSY!!
Review: It is so nice that this book is bringing a controversy that never ended to our attention again!! Major scholars are also backing this up!! Richard Rubenstein, a Rhodes scholar AND professor of conflict resolution SPECIALIZING IN RELIGIOUS CONFLICT, in WHEN JESUS BECAME GOD, "With vivid detail and meticulous research recreates the political intrigue, riots, and power struggles of one of the most critical moments in history - one with startling parallels to our own time." This CONTINUING STRUGGLE split the eastern and western church YEARS LATER and is playing out today, thanks to books like Dan Brown's.

Rating:
Summary: Mind-Blowing
Review: It is such a cliché in popular fiction today for over excited readers to exclaim, "I couldn't put this book down!" Seriously, what kind of life do you have that you cannot afford to never put a book down? That said, I have rarely had a book grip me as this new novel from Dan Brown has. It really is addictive, I avoided such trivial things as school and eating just to read some more of this book, any chance I could get. After I read Brown's earlier Robert Langdon thriller, Angels and Demons, I knew he had a real talent as a thriller writer. The DaVinci Code solidifies this opinion, as it puts Brown on the pedestal as one of the best thriller writers going.

Brown?s stories are so great because the settings and the history behind them are absolutely intriguing. This is evident on almost every page of the book. The main thrust of the story is the mysterious death of an art academic at the famous Paris museum, the Louvre. At first, it seems to be a fairly simple homicide, but it becomes much more confusing when Harvard symbiologist Robert Langdon gets to the scene, at the request of the French National Police. Upon examining the body, he begins to realize that there are mysterious messages all over the crime scene, some connected to the masterpieces themselves. Aided by a French police cryptologist, Langdon begins to put the pieces together. The puzzle paints a disturbing portrait, and powerful international interests begin targeting Langdon.

For the conspiracy Langdon has discovered is no simple matter of politics or money, he has come upon the basis of Western Civilization itself. Hidden in the works of master painter Leonardo Da Vinci is a secret so controversial, it would change the world forever. Guarding the secret and the power it possesses is a shadowy ancient brotherhood, known as the Priory of Sion. For centuries, this group of men has passed the secret down through the ages, guarding it by taking extreme security measures. The secret, now, is up for grabs, and everyone wants to get their hands on it. The real life Catholic sect known as Opus Dei is also in the mix, with a group of their officials conspiring to bring ruin to the hated Priory and seizing the power themselves. They employ a horrifying assassin to hunt down the ancient secret. Langdon finds himself stuck in the middle, with groups following him and the police hot on his trail. He and his companion never give up though, and, using their combined knowledge, begin to unlock the maze of codes and clues that lead to the secret of the ages.

The best part about Browns novels is that they are just non-stop excitement and intrigue. Every page has something going on, some new code, some new development. It is just insane. Some might complain that he throws in too much history, but I found the informational really enthralling. Another attribute of this novel is its mysterious and haunting tone, the reader feels like he or she has been let into a secret chase for an amazing artifact. Also, his setting descriptions are wonderful, I fully plan on taking Angels and Demons with me when I go to Rome, and The DaVinci Code would be good for a trip to Paris or England. It is clear that Brown really goes the extra mile for his readers by giving them well-researched and exciting books. You really learn a lot when you read his books, including little snippets of information you will just shake your head at. Nowhere is this more evident than when Brown describes some amazing mysteries in the actual paintings. I guarantee you will never look at the Last Supper the same way again. There are some downsides. I did not like how Brown portrays "the secret" as if it had some basis in fact, real life. In reality, the idea he presents has been disproven many times. I wish he had included a bibliography of his research materials, I would really enjoy reading those also. The ending is way too incomplete, I wanted to throw the book against the wall in frustration. How could you do that to us Dan? Oh well, I will just have to wait patiently for the next novel.

Rating:
Summary: Good read, well researched - weak ending
Review: It keeps your interest 3/4 of the way through the book. Unfortunately, it appears all the author's research and clever storytelling falls victim to a rather loose-ended, 'I wrote the ending in one afternoon' finale. It would have been hard to write a believable ending anyway. Still a good read. Two obvious blunders in a highly detailed and researched book (they aren't pivotal to the plot). Adam was offered a 'fruit' in the bible not an 'apple' and Sir Isaac Newton was a virgin his whole life.

Rating:
Summary: Very Good Read
Review: It managed to hold my attention to the end, though I got tired of excessive detail in some scenes and other perceived literary sins that I suppose others think to be particulary admirable strengths, opinions varying as they do. As a novel this is a very good book, the author has a rabbit in the hat and produces it at the right time and in a manner calculated to thrill the reader. He certainly had me fooled. Very entertaining book, no doubt about that.

However: as a source for symbolic anecdotes and occult lore, it is not a very good book, caveat emptor. Before quoting the great revelations herein as "facts" make sure that you check them through multiple sources on the web or in a reference library if you have one handy.

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Summary: This book is truly astounding.
Review: It manages to explain the meanings behind so many things in our culture and life and completely rewrite the christian religion in the process. It's just amazing. He's taken essentially a massive amount of historical research and groundbreaking revelations and wrapped it around a very fast moving and exciting 'fictional' plot which keeps you going for more. I read the book in two days I was so amazed by it. The author is a genious.