January 2004: Dan Brown's THE DA VINCI CODE
So I finally got off my lazy duff and read Dan Brown's summer smash, THE DA VINCI CODE. With over 4 million copies now in print, THE DA VINCI CODE is the hit of the year, outsold only by HARRY POTTER, not a bad feat for a fellow New Hampshire author.
Brown is an academic, and like his previous novel, ANGELS & DEMONS, which I read in the spring, CODE is a history/theology lecture disguised as a thriller-which I mean with no disrespect! Both novels are brilliant page-turners that keep you guessing until the very end. Brown is doing for history, art and the religion what Michael Crichton has long done for science-showing that real facts make for stunning fiction.
The CODE's exploration of how paganism first conflicted, then submitted to Christianity, brought to mind another novel for me: Marion Zimmer Bradley's THE MISTS OF AVALON. I consider this one of the all-time great novels, which is interesting because it's as different from THE DA VINCI CODE as a novel can be. Bradley's novel is a work of epic fantasy, involving witches, wizards and King Arthur. If you enjoy big, sweeping works of fiction, definitely give THE MISTS OF AVALON a try.
|
