I READ THIS IN 3 DAYS, SO CAN YOU! GREAT FICTIONAL!

Dan Brown's Angels and Demons is a fast-paced detective drama that combines science, art, religion, and murder.

Harvard symbology professor Robert Langdon is the protagonist who finds himself at a Swiss nuclear research facility. It seems a scientist has been murdered and the infamous Illuminati society is somehow involved. Some antimatter has been taken, and Langdon joins the scientist's daughter, Vittoria, on a mad dash through some of Rome's most famous landmarks, in an effort to find it before the Vatican is leveled.

I liked the plot of Angels and Demons and found much of middle section wonderfully absorbing and tense, as Robert and Vittoria decipher ancient clues and race from place to place in Rome, fast on the heels of a murderer. The beginning of the book, which discusses antimatter, was slow-going for me and the conclusion is way over the top in terms of realism. The timeline was a major stumbling block: Being able to travel great distances across Rome in minutes (even seconds) took away some credibility for me.

In spite of the weaknesses, Angels and Demons is very exciting and at times, even spine-tingling. If you have been to Rome, you will enjoy revisiting the city in this book. You'll also learn about the inner workings of the Vatican, and about the Illuminati, which I found fascinating. This is also my favorite of Dan Brown's Collection.

Needs less ashamed Catholic scientists and more science

I am a scientist and I was raised Catholic. At one point in the book, the pope is preaching about how science has no morals and cannot guide the world ethically and blah blah blah. All the Catholic science characters that work at CERN are listening and thinking to themselves, "Oh my God, that's so true. I feel so ashamed to be a scientist" and blah blah.

I am sitting there reading with the book in my hand, thinking, "Really? REALLY? Are you sure you don't want to disagree with the pope and say that scientists such as yourselves can be moral without needing the church to guide you?" Because that's what I would have said, if I lived in Dan Brown's world and I had to listen to that speech! Sheesh.

In a more general critique of the book, Dan Brown needs to work on leading up to and executing plot twists. I can imagine that his plot twists sound really good on an outline, but they do not work in the novel. Being as vague as I can be to avoid spoiling the book, certain characters turn out to be evil, but Dan Brown does not provide good foreshadowing. He provides explanations after the fact and he has the characters evilly monologue and talk about how it was "so obvious" and "duh," but it does not work for me. It is too much of a 180 degree turn, too quickly. Dan Brown did the same thing in The Da Vinci Code. The writing is such that you can see it coming right before it happens, in what must be Brown's attempt at hasty foreshadowing, but it goes against character's entire development. Dan Brown, EXTEND your foreshadowing across many chapters! Do not just shove it all in before the twist. It is annoying.

Lastly, for a book supposedly about the forces of science trying to undermine the church, there is VERY LITTLE SCIENCE. No biology. No biochemistry. No modern chemistry, only proto-chemistry. A little bit of modern physics (for the plot about anti-matter) and some physics history (Galileo). Mostly talk about angles and "science" symbolism, and a bad joke about ions, but disappointingly very little science. Come on Dan Brown, couldn't you have one of the surprise twists be that the Vatican had buildings dispersed like the architecture of the cell or something? "My God, the next clue must be in the mitochondria! That direction!" Something like that.

Oh well. I can't really blame Dan Brown. No, I blame all the people who told me that Angels and Demons was better than The Da Vinci Code! Damn you, bad recommendations! At least I had fun raging about all the misunderstandings of science. It was actually kind of entertaining in the beginning, which is what disappoints me the most about the end. I want to like this book, but the character and plot development does not make it to the end. Dan Brown has interesting premises, but not writing.

Fellow readers of the book, please do not vote me unhelpful if you only disagree with me. Unhelpful would be, "Boo, bad writing, did not like." I put more effort into my review than that.

Angels & Demons

I admire Dan Brown's writing style. I initially saw "The Vinci Code" movie and was impressed with the twists and turns, but found that so much was going on that I needed to follow-up with reading the book. What a revelation! I could not put the book down. It further stimulated research on such bits and pieces of information, ie "Opus Dei".
My next read was "Angels & Demons" which is another book that keeps you on the edge of your seat, and discourages you from putting it down due to the drama and suspense it created. Ancient enemies, the Vatican and the Illuminatti are the focal point of a 500 year old vendetta, that evolves around a canister of Anti-matter that has been stolen from CERN in Switzerland. The Anti-matter material has been made via the Large Hadron Collider that has been so controversial around the World. The "Illuminatti", included scientists, artists, architects and other intellectuals who were considered enemies of the Church for embracing Science, which was not compatible with strong Catholic Doctrine of that period. The Heritics were persecuted and murdered. This day the screws will be reversed as the sitting Pope at the Vatican has died (Murdered) and all the Cardinals from around the Globe are at the Vatican to elect a new Pope.
I wanted to read this book before I saw the movie. I strongly recommend any open minded person to consider reading this book. You may not agree with Mr. Brown, but you will surely conclude that he writes one heck of a good story that is both entertaining and mentally stimulating.
When I saw "The Da Vinci Code" movie, I initially thought that the subject matter would not appeal to my general areas of interest. I could not have been more wrong. Mr. Brown does impeccable research, provides bits and pieces of fact, and wraps it around superb story telling.

Norman M. Taft

Better than The Da Vinci Code!

I read The Da Vinci Code because of all of the attention it was getting. I truly enjoyed that book and went on to read Dan Brown's other books.
Angels & Demons was the 2nd book by Dan Brown that I read and I found the book to be far more interesting, with better character development, more descriptive text and more suspense.
The story is wildly creative and the use of ambigrams (words that appear the same whether read right-side-up or up-side-down), the Illuminati (an ancient secret society), the conclave (the Catholic process of selecting a new Pope), humanity (including members of clergy) at it's best and worst, all added something that can only be described as superbly imaginative.
Say what you will about the "clatter" surrounding The Da Vinci Code, but this book was captivating to the point that even that which would seem almost impossible was easily accepted as possible. The characters in this novel, including Langdon from The Da Vinci Code, were deep and complex with inner-demons that they faced whilst facing the true demons of the real world.
The Da Vinci Code was good, but this novel was phenomenal; absolutely perfect. I would give it a 6/5 (6 out of 5) if it made sense to do so.