Book Review: Inferno - Dan Brown

I recently finished Dan Brown's newest book: Inferno. I was an enormous fan of The Da Vinci Code. I picked it up used while on a trip, and was so enthralled that I stayed up far too late reading regardless of the exam I had to write the next morning. Even now when pick up The Da Vinci Code to re-read it, I find myself a little spellbound.

Then The Lost Symbol was published, and I was disappointed. The importance of the secret object(s) seemed overblown, and it annoyed me how things switched between a plot-based tchotchke being metaphorical and literal and then back again.

Inferno took a similar step backwards from the level of The Da Vinci Code. The big conspiracy could have been resolved with a short conversation, the ending was underwhelming, and the book as a whole seemed very preachy. In short, I was disappointed.

Newest Book

Amanda and I heard about Dan Brown's newest novel today. We'd both like to read it, but we had mixed feelings bout his previous books. I loved The DaVinci Code. I bought a used copy on a whim a few years after the book had come out and spent half the night reading it. I finally went to sleep very late only because I had an exam the next day and needed at least a few short hours of sleep.

After that, I was incredibly excited for The Lost Symbol. ...it wasn't the same. I didn't care about the penalty for failure (oh noes, people will see Masonic rituals out of context and see famously people participating...) The back and forth as to whether the keystone was a physical object or a metaphor for something else got old quickly too.

So we're both looking forward to Dan Brown's newest, but not without some concern. I guess we're cautiously optimistic... but not in the same way the Penny Arcade folks were a few years back.