The Da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon) Paperback – March 31, 2009

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown is an international best seller that deals with a major cover up by the Christian church that spans thousands and thousands of years. Typically when you involve religion in the topic, it's bound to get many different types of reactions and feelings from the crowd and this is no different. I mean religion does sell right? This is the perfect example of an author cashing in on that aspect. However, when reading this book, I just took it for what it is and that is a book that is suppose to be highly suspenseful and an action thriller. Oh and of course, discovering the big mystery that is suppose to shake the Christian church to its foundation. The Da Vinci Code I can say without a shadow of a doubt, is an excellent book from start to finish provided that you take it for what it is. This can be very hard obviously if you yourself is a devoted Christian because you'll probably not like what the author says about your religion here in this book even though it's considered a fiction piece of work. If you can get past that though, this book is the ultimate definition of a page turner!The Da Vinci Code basically is about what happens when everything is not as simple as we'd like things to be. We were always told the story of Jesus Christ through the Bible as it is suppose to detail an accurate picture of his life. But what if not everything we read is accurate and that the Bible is an actual cover up for the truth of what actually happened with Jesus Christ? Everyone loves a good conspiracy theory and The Da Vinci Code cashes in on that notion when members of an ultra secret brotherhood charged with protecting some important documents that reveal the actual truth about the life of Jesus Christ are murdered.It's surprising to find out that the entire book takes place within the span of just one night. Not many authors can do this and I believe this author uses the same tactic with his other books as well. The problem here for many is that there just isn't enough time to develop the characters. Therefore, what I read from many reviewers is that due to shallow characters, they don't feel an emotional attachment to the story and that they don't care about the outcome. I usually promote strong character growth as well but I find the story in the Da Vinci Code good enough for me to give it a pass in this case.The writing is superb from Dan Brown and this I believe is the first book I have read from this popular author. I find that the book immediately gripped me right from the beginning. I do admit that I had my doubts in the beginning. Like other readers, I usually find books on the best seller list as overrated but The Da Vinci Code is anything but that. The author really sets an incredible pace and he has a knack for not giving away too much all in one go. He slowly lures you in and you'll definitely be saying to yourself "just one more chapter!". Some might not like this as if I remember correctly, it's exactly at the halfway point of this book that the exact mystery is revealed to the readers.As a thriller and mystery, you're going to get your usual doses of action set pieces and the author gives just enough to satisfy our thirsts without drowning us. What I also love about reading The Da Vinci Code is that the author sprinkles in a bit of historical education throughout the book. Those were definitely a blast to read through because typically, we normally don't relate or think about it from a historian's point of view. And believe it or not, you'll be rushing to your computer throughout the book searching for images that the author talks about. So not only are we getting a fantastic suspense thriller in the book, we are also educating ourselves in the process!Whether you believe in what the author writes here is definitely up to you. Everyone loves a good conspiracy and I'm sure The Da Vinci Code stirred up a hornet's next when it was published. I personally am not a completely devoted and religious person but I do believe in a higher being. I definitely read this book with an open mind and it was pretty shocking to find what the author had to say although many others have reported that Dan Brown basically took the ideas of what other authors/historians have written in other lesser known books and used it here in The Da Vinci Code. Nonetheless, this book was a complete page turner and I could hardly put it down! I think this might take the spot for the fastest book read in my collection.

A great book that kept me turning the pages late into the night! Story was intriguing especially the religious aspects I learned a lot about religion and religious symbols from this book!!It felt more like an experience than just a book!We need more books like this one!

I read this book recently with the latest media fuss in mind (and to get the story straight before seeing the movie). While it's true the book isn't nearly as intellectually satisfying as the fine works of Umberto Eco, it is indeed a page turner. Practically every chapter is a mini-cliffhanger. And yes, it is quite visual, but since we live in a movie/tv dominated world, is there any wonder? Forty million readers can't be wrong! -- and they aren't even all Frenchmen (or French movie-goers). I'd have to agree with them, too: Overall it's a good, and fast, read. But what I suspect has made the book so immensely popular is that it does do a nice job of popularizing (by way of the action/thriller genre) a griping spiritual, or at least psychosexual, truth that's been around as long as humanity itself (remember those well-endowed Earth Mother figurines they find in prehistoric caves?), though has indeed been systematically repressed by Christianity and the other patriarchal religions.That said, some of the book's scholarship does seem sloppy. What actually happened at the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. (the telling of which, by the way, the author, Brown, puts in the mouth of his most nefarious character) may well be a point of some contention with the Church. Brown should simply have added a long paragraph here, or even an extra page or two, to his 450+ pages to get things right and make his argument indisputable, instead of egregiously oversimplifying. The fact (readily confirmed by modern biblical scholarship) is that there certainly were many competing schools of Christian doctrine (including Christology), and many other scriptural texts (including gospels) that varied from the canonical texts. And these doctrinal and scriptural variants existed from the very beginnings of Christianity. The Church's claim that the winning theology's victory had more to do with "the Holy Spirit" than with politics can very ably be labeled the Church's, if not Western history's, biggest cover-up.The book's plot is certainly not perfect either. For example, the ease with which the French police enter the territorial U.K. and do as they please (even as they couldn't do likewise in the British Embassy in Paris) was laughable. The answer to the riddle involving Isaac Newton, which gave the symbology and cryptology experts in the novel such pause, would have come to any school kid who knew only the first thing about Newton in two seconds or less (it only took me about three). One of the same experts' difficulty with DaVinci-esque backward writing (which surely everyone else in the world knows about) was a bit lame too.The charge of Opus Dei bashing looks like a crock. Anyone who's read the book all the way through realizes Opus Dei is exonerated in the end. It's fictional (and inexplicably gullible) leader even makes rather substantial monetary amends for his mistakes. Most of the membership are even acknowledged as mainstream do-gooders. But the practices of some Opus Dei members are indeed accurately related, and any organization that sanctions such medieval masochism and misogyny should certainly be able to stand -- if not enjoy! -- some alleged "bashing."