Confession: I love Dan Brown books.
Yes, I know the writing is awful. Yes, I know the character is a self-insert Gary Stu. Yes, I know the same thing happens over and over again in every novel. Yes, I know I should be ashamed.
Totally not, though.
I read The DaVinci Code at about 16 because it drummed a lot of controversy. Announcing that I wanted to read it was an exciting moment for my mom because after refusing to read anything on which I wasn’t going to be tested that wasn’t Harry Potter, I finally expressed an interest in a book that was unprompted by her. Middle school and high school didn’t encourage reading and it took me a long time to get over it.
Anyway, with The DaVinci Code, I was going through something of a rebellion at the time – not anything dangerous, just trying to come to grips with the fact that I’d never be the good Catholic my extended family wanted me to be and would receive a fair amount of ridicule from them for it. So…enter Dan Brown with an exaggerated anti-Catholic Church novel. (Fun Fact: I came to terms with my under-developed religion area of the brain unscathed, and eventually graduated from a Catholic university. I even sometimes miss said Catholic university).
I next read Angels and Demons the summer after, and I enjoyed that even more than the previous book. It was actually the first book featuring Robert Langdon, and it was in the same trashy thriller style. The Lost Symbol came next, and then, this year (well, published last year but read this year), Inferno.
For some reason I didn’t like Inferno as much as previous stories. Maybe I’m outgrowing trashy thrillers (unlikely), but I didn’t find it as fun and took awhile to get through it. I was totally blindsided by the twist (seriously, you’d think after all this time, I’d have seen it coming, but nah), so that was enjoyable, but the overall experience wasn’t as good as my previous experiences.
I think my biggest issue was the use of amnesia as a plot point. I didn’t enjoy not really knowing what was going on through most of the story (it’s why I didn’t like the ‘Bourne Trilogy’ too). Langdon was clueless since he was the one with amnesia, and so the reader was as well. The premise was interesting enough – a mad genius created a virus that would infect everyone and, presumably, wipe out a ton of the planet’s population because humans cannot exist on this planet at the rate they are populating it (and he takes it into his own hands to fix this). And he was obsessed with Dante’s The Divine Comedy and left all kinds of adorable clues to finding his virus that had to do with Dante. The World Health Organization gets involved. There’s a mo-ped chase.
I felt like Brown answered too many questions at once. I would have preferred if the answers were more spread out throughout the book, to make for better pacing of the story. I wish we’d seen a little more about the Provost and the Consortium. Of everyone in the story who wasn’t Langdon, the shadowy organization that helped the mad genius accomplish his research was the most fascinating.
What I did like about the novel – as I like about all Brown’s novels – is a) Robert Langdon is endearing because he’s such a raging nerd and b) the setting. Inferno ran through Florence (obviously, as this was Dante’s beloved home) and some other parts of Europe. 3 of 4 of Brown’s Langdon books take place in Europe – Italy specifically. As someone who would like to explore Europe, these novels make me really excited about it for some reason. (I don’t know why. There are so many things to psych you up about Europe and my brain chooses Dan Brown books. Go figure.)
I also like all the symbolism and the history that goes into the book. This, combined with the setting, really make the novels enjoyable in spite of the fact that the writing can be ridiculous at times. They make the story very real – which it needs, since a middle-aged but handsome Harvard professor who swims and is obsessed with his Harris tweed jacket and a Mickey Mouse watch from his parents doesn’t exactly scream “HEY THIS IS A LESSON IN REALISM!”
But as I said, history, symbolism and setting make the books interesting. In spite of the fact that Brown’s books can be clumsy, it’s clear that he does put a lot of research into them and blends facts and fiction into a fairly gripping – if sometimes heavy handed – web.
Overall, I’d recommend Inferno. I didn’t like it as much as Brown’s other Langdon stories, but I was entertained. When it comes to trashy thrillers, that is key, and Inferno doesn’t disappoint in that regard.
words in scarlet ink 