Sometime last month I saw a hell lot of reviews on books from matawalaboy & then mbfarookh, there were a few from Sujata also. This inspired me to start my innings in this area. Until now my reading was limited to Marathi/Hindi books, novels, a plethora of magazines & of course technical books. Astrology is a separate topic and have got a bunch of books on this topic too.
I chose the current bestseller and red-hot book from Dan Brown ’The Da Vinci Code’. I think I am lucky to start with this book as this book not only kept my interest but also now encouraging me to diverse! Usually I wait for the movie to show up! :) But now I know what I would have missed in all the novel based movies. The power of imagination is un-matched, that’s why people who read Godfather always have greater image of Don Carleone than what the great actor has displayed on screen.
I do not want to go into the plot and won’t be spoiling your fun (if you haven’t read it yet).
Great attention to details
Almost to the point of being irritating than useful at times. The attention to minor details is the greatest virtue of this book. Too many details actually take you to the scene which is fascinating initially and when the situation is mysterious but a lot of pages spent on the details of how Sophie proceeded to her Grandpere’s house north to the city is a little too much for me! But overall this works in favor of the story and also at the time of solving the code. The controversial stuff which is detailed at times and surprisingly short when it need not be also show some dishonesty to the facts or real history...sort of twisted truth to make the story more masala (spicy).
Controversial Stuff
Apart from that the book manages to offend almost 50% of the world & more specifically the Roman Catholic ones. The controversy of the picture of the last supper (the Lady Magdalene & references to her, chalice, the cup, The supposedly/accused real history of Christ & the real story of Christ & how he was actually a married guy with the lady carried his family-line, the royal-line (has daughter names Sarah).
The fact that the stalwarts like Vinci, Sir Newton (yes) were heads of the ’Priory of Scion’ (the secret society that protected the Holy Grail, the real history & the old testament as it was before the fusion of Paganism and Christianity etc etc. How Vatican manipulated and used force to kill-off the opposition and also the secret society of the ’’knights Templar’’ blah blah blah.
The ’Opus Dei’ angle and related links to Vatican with money being transferred from Vatican to this group also I think puts material for controversy.
Interesting Stuff
Some interesting read was How Vinci was a diverse guy and was also a mathematician, he was also bi-sexual and watched corpse for hrs to understand human anatomy and what not. I was most impressed with the information I got on some of the topics like ’why the smile from Mona Lisa’, ’Why Mona Lisa looks like the way she looks’. ’The concept of ’phi’: 1.61 or (is it 1.116?), the concept of divine feminine & such.
The most interesting stuff is the the messages/clues Jac Sauniere leaves for Princess Sophia and Robert Langdon, the concept of cryptex, how the decipher the code to come to answers to first get the special key, then the account number (fibonnacci series 1123581321) of the vault, then the actual cryptex which has two layers & the final location of the Grail. Of course, these clues constitute the majority of the plot making it too a very interesting read.
Characterization
This is the best part of the story. The characters are built extremely well, there are quite a few coincidences that make proceedings too simple at times and difficult to believe. Bezu Fache’s (French chief of police) character is built in a most fascinating & believable way but why this character blames Langdon for the murder is silly overall but without this the whole story would collapse. The ’Teacher’ is a great twist and not too predictable. Langdon the hero of the story is well presented & comes across as a coherent character. Sophie’s character is just ok.
Conclusion
Personally I didn’t like the ending. It was a letdown to an overall wonderful journey. I recommend everyone to read this one if you haven’t already, it is of course worth the read. It may not be the best or a classic but it surely is entertaining and will keep you hooked to it.
Thanks matawalaboy(Mayank), Afrank (Sujata) & mb--Farookh for the encouragement to start innings in this category! I have now acquired quite a bit of books in last few weeks. The next one I will read might be Jason Bourne series. Hope this review was good enough.