general

Next to Britt Gillette's "Conquest of Paradise", this is the best book I've read in a long time. I'm a first time Dan Brown reader but I'm hooked! I stayed up all night and didn't quit until I finished, blurry eyed and sleepy. I found myself believing every word and had to stop and remember that it's just fiction! I was amazed at the inside information about the Vatican (especially the library), and I finally got out a map and books from my trip to Rome to see if I could find all the churches. Anti-matter, illuminati, choosing a pope - all of it was fascinating. When I finished, I had to laugh thinking about the fact they never ate, slept or made comfort stops and neither could I. The ending was a total surprise! Anyone who enjoys non-stop action and information shouldn't miss this one.

No, not the rock 'n roll group, but three of the four elementals of science - earth, wind (air), fire, and water. These play a major role in Dan Brown's novel of an ancient secret brotherhood, the Illuminati, and their quest to condemn and destroy Cathoicism as an organizational entity. Robert Langdon, a Harvard symbiologist who also appears in "The Da Vinci Code", finds proof that the Illuminati still exist, and have hijacked a cannister of anti-matter from the Conseil Europeen le Recherche Nucleaire (CERN) and hidden it somewhere beneath the Vatican on the eve of the election of a new pope. A physicist has been murdered and Langdon and the physicist's daughter, also a scientist at CERN, follow a 400 year old trail through Rome to prevent the incineration of the Catholic Church as we know it today.

"Angels & Demons" pulls no punches and provides cover to cover action. Sure there are assassins, 15,000 mph jets, anti-matter, mad scientists, murdered cardinals, sealed crypts, abandoned cathedrals, and ambigram branding irons, but Brown has it all hang together. The ambigrams are of special note because they read the same, right side up or upside down, and this figures prominently in the story. And the entire story, all 600 pages or so, takes place in one day! Still, Brown hurls the reader along from one elemental to the next with breakneck speed and hardly a chance to catch one's breath.

CERN really does exist, as does anti-matter, and Brown points out that CERN has recently succeeded in producing the first particles of anti-matter and it is now the most powerful energy source known to man. So, there is a lot of cerebral exercising in the book, be it physics, biology, church history, or papal conclaves. While I, personally, found the ending somewhat predictable, Brown poses a larger question. Will this substance, like atomic energy, be used to save the world or condemn it? And this little piece of brain candy, as someone called it, gives us a glimpse of What if. Good job Mr. Brown.

Having read "The Da Vinci Code" I wondered if Dan Brown would measure up for me in his other works. I bought a copy of Angels and Demons and I was not disappointed. Robert Langdon, professor and symbologist is introduced to us in this novel. Robert is awakened in the middle of the night, and practically ordered to come to Europe, lured by the a grisly fax which reels him with one word "Illuminati". The Illuminati were a group of scientists vilifed by the Catholic Church hundreds of years ago, and believed to be an extinct group. Robert is mesmerized and boards a super-sonic plane to a high-tech scientific research corporation. From this point forward, the novel progresses at breakneck speed as Robert, along with the help of an interesting female character named Vittoria, [who has a huge stake in the outcome of the novel] literally race against time to save Vatican City. Together they must travel to Vatican City and attempt to follow an ancient "map" to the person responsible for a threat to destroy Vatican City with a weapon of science - anti-matter. Although there is plenty of suspense, treachery, and violence in this novel, I felt strong undercurrent of faith, not in any specific religious dogma, but just simple, human faith. This is a very well written novel with so many twists and turns, the reader has to turn really immerse him or herself into the book. The character, Robert Langdon has such terrific appeal in this novel as well as "The DaVinci Code" because he is written to be so very human. He makes mistakes, he doubts himself, he continues forward when there seems to be no hope. He make us WANT him to succeed! The surprise ending is a good one, that I did not guess. Bear with the background information at the beginning. It does read a bit slow, but once events begin to unfold, this novel is unstoppable! I look forward to more Dan Brown novels with Robert Langdon as the central character. This is the kind of character you will fall in love with and want to read about more and more.