Dan Brown - Angels and Demons

review by Brian Lowen 11th June 09
A cracking good thriller that gets you enthralled right from the start. I hope the film of the book recently released is as good, although I somewhat doubt it. I enjoyed this book better than The Da Vinci Code.

When a world renowned scientist is found brutally murdered, a Harvard professor, Robert Langdon, is summoned to identify the mysterious symbol burned onto the dead man’s chest. His conclusion: it is the work of the Illuminati – a secret brotherhood presumed extinct for nearly four hundred years – now reborn to continue their bitter vendetta against their sworn enemy – the Catholic church.

In Rome, the college of cardinals assembles to elect a new pope. Yet somewhere within the walls of the Vatican an unstoppable bomb of terrifying power relentlessly counts down to oblivion. While the minutes tick away, Langdon joins forces with Vittoria Vetra, a beautiful and mysterious Italian scientist, to decipher the labyrinthine trail of ancient symbols that snakes across Rome to the long forgotten Illuminati lair – a secret refuge wherein lies the only hope for the Vatican.

But, with each revelation comes another twist, another turn in the plot, which leaves Langdon and Vetra reeling and at the mercy of a seemingly invincible enemy.

It comes as quite a surprise to find that when near to the end of the book that after all this frenetic energy it has all occurred in just one day. Then at the end there is not just one clever twist to the tale, but several.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will look out for the other two books Dan Brown has written ; Digital Fortress and Deception Point. I am not surprised that he has only written four books so far because the amount of research he must have undertaken to write this book is extraordinary.