The DaVinci Code

[inulro]

Seeing as I'm still awake:

I finally started to read it this week. It's bad - the prose is awful & very amateurish (except I know lots of amateurs who can structure much nicer sentences). I could write a book on the factual inaccuracies[1]. It is almost funny, but not quite. It is definitely the version for people who couldn't get through either Foucault's Pendulum (which actually *is* funny, and is making fun of people who believe this stuff) or Holy Blood & the Holy Grail (which is tosh, but has the advantage of being very well written tosh).

Yet I can't stop reading it. It's very compelling crap.

[1] The truly offensive one is the "Fact" about the Priory of Sion in the introduction. The document is indeed in the Bibliotheque Nationale, but scholars agree it's a hoax.

Comments

[human-racer.livejournal.com]

It's awful, isn't it? But fascinatingly awful. A bit like watching a train crash.

Not that I've ever watched a train crash, mind, but you get the idea...

[zoo-music-girl.livejournal.com]

This is the second post on that book on my friends list in 12 hours. [Unknown site tag] did a full review yesterday. She said much the same thing.

[zoo-music-girl.livejournal.com]

Oh arse. That would be swanofkennet

Did you get my email btw?

[aeia.livejournal.com]

I quite enjoyed it. Its definitely an easy read, in that it doesnt take any concentration to read it. I dont know how accurate it is but it is fiction and is not meant to be accurate. Though apparently lots of people have believed what he wrote is all true.

I'm just finishing Digital Fortress at the moment and that is very silly and a lot of the computer stuff is not accurate but its still compelling.

[naturalbornkaos.livejournal.com]

Yet I can't stop reading it. It's very compelling crap.

Isn't this the nature of most bestsellers though? They're best selling not because they're any good, in the sense you mean, but because they're addictive... :)

(Got your video btw, can't remember if I emailed to say or not, been mostly PC-less the last week or so... thank you very much! Haven't watched it yet though!)

[bar-bar-ella.livejournal.com]

It is definitely the version for people who couldn't get through either Foucault's Pendulum

*chortle* Ah, thankyou so much for saying that. :) Being the huge fan of F.P. that I am, I've leant it to many people over the years. I'm never offended if they give up on it and say they couldn't get into it. It's not the easiest novel ever written, for sure. But it does amuse me how a few of those same people have recently raced through DaVinci Code... :D

[inulro.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid it's not my original thought - I read it elsewhere, but having started the book, I see that it's true.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

The Holy Blood And The Holy Grail got me through flu once, but I've avoided The Da Vinci Code so far. Is it fiction? (Well, obviously it's fiction, but is it 'and then Joseph and I found ourselves inexplicably escorted out of the ruins by an angry man in a fez, who had clearly been suborned by the Shadowy Elders' or is it 'Joseph's heart beat faster as he saw the angry man in the fez below them at the entrance to the ruins'?)

[inulro.livejournal.com]

It's a bad mainstream thriller, so not really either of the above.

[zenmonkeykstop.livejournal.com]

Those are the exact two books that i recommended to the last person who mentioned liking the Da Vinci Code. Spooky.

[inulro.livejournal.com]

Not spooky. Logical.

[sheepthief.livejournal.com]

I well remember your derision that I was so gullible as to think that there might be some truth in Holy Blood. I've avoided such things ever since. =;-)

[inulro.livejournal.com]

It's got some good individual points. The problem is that the authors claim completely unrelated things are, in fact, evidence of a conspiracy.

[mimmimmim.livejournal.com]

I was bitterly disappointed with this. Loads of people had raved about it to me, and I knew it wouldn't be as good as Foucault's Pendulum, but I didn't expect it to be as bad as it was. I was annoyed at having wasted money on it.

[inulro.livejournal.com]

Fortunately, my mother sent me her copy when she finished with it, so I did not pay money for it (failing that, I was going to take it out of the library).