Deception PointDan Brown One of the biggest problems I had with Da Vinci Code was the recurring tactic of withholding information from the readers, giving us vague, dire pronouncements instead of letting us judge the facts for ourselves. This amateurism is still in evidence in Deception Point; the second sentence of the book reads: "Geologist Charles Brophy had endured the savage splendor of this terrain for years, and yet nothing could prepare him for a fate as barbarous and unnatural as the one about to befall him." There’s nothing really barbarous about being shoved to your death out of a […]

The Da Vinci CodeDan Brown This book surprised me. With all the uproar from the Church, I did not expect it to be so reverent, so respectful, of forms of faith. The history of the Catholic Church is very critical at times, but by the time the book wraps up, everyone is given at least one sympathetic dimension, even Opus Dei. Overall the book avoided villainizing or bashing any one religious group, which is remarkable considering how easy it would have been. The symbolic and historical depth of the book is also quite interesting, although none of it is terribly […]