I know it’s been a while, but yes it did take me this long to read The Lost Symbol – partly because I’ve been busy with work but mostly because it was not the page-turner I thought it would be. As a thriller, it is quite predictable. If you’ve read more than one Dan Brown book, you can tell his writing is quite formulaic. However, I found that The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons were much more intriguing, thought-provoking, and fast-paced. The Lost Symbol started out the same, but somewhere along the way the plot failed to maintain my attention. The underlying themes and message were quite profound but their delivery was not as powerful as they are in his other books.
In The Lost Symbol, Langdon is quickly caught up in an adventure from the very beginning as usual. This time, his lifelong friend, Peter Solomon, and his family are central to the narrative. Peter is a Freemason of the highest degree and harbors the organization’s most captivating secrets. His sister, Katherine, is a scientist who is secretly conducting experiments on Noetic Science – the study and explorations of the nature and potential power of the mind ( its consciousness, soul, and spirit). However, he and his family are under attack by a lone perpetrator who seeks to reveal the secrets of the Masons and destroy Katherine’s research. Sounds interesting, right? It is! But extraneous dialogue, excessive descriptions, and irrelevant character development all detract from the central storyline instead of developing a sense of suspense.
In the end, the ultimate message is that much of what is written in the Bible is a celebration of the human mind and the potential that humans can achieve when they use their mind to its fullest potential. It is about the untapped power of the human mind and the collective unconscious of humanity. It is about how science and religion can eventually coexist - a common theme throughout Dan Brown's works. This can happen not so much by having blind faith but simply by changing one’s perspective.
In The Lost Symbol, Langdon is quickly caught up in an adventure from the very beginning as usual. This time, his lifelong friend, Peter Solomon, and his family are central to the narrative. Peter is a Freemason of the highest degree and harbors the organization’s most captivating secrets. His sister, Katherine, is a scientist who is secretly conducting experiments on Noetic Science – the study and explorations of the nature and potential power of the mind ( its consciousness, soul, and spirit). However, he and his family are under attack by a lone perpetrator who seeks to reveal the secrets of the Masons and destroy Katherine’s research. Sounds interesting, right? It is! But extraneous dialogue, excessive descriptions, and irrelevant character development all detract from the central storyline instead of developing a sense of suspense.
In the end, the ultimate message is that much of what is written in the Bible is a celebration of the human mind and the potential that humans can achieve when they use their mind to its fullest potential. It is about the untapped power of the human mind and the collective unconscious of humanity. It is about how science and religion can eventually coexist - a common theme throughout Dan Brown's works. This can happen not so much by having blind faith but simply by changing one’s perspective.
While not my favorite Dan Brown novel, I still recommend The Lost Symbol to fans of The Da Vinci Code or Angels and Demons.
Thanks for the post. Sounds like after all the hype and secrecy regarding the book, it failed to deliver like The Da Vinci Code.
ReplyDeleteIt's usually difficult for a followup of such an influential novel to have the same effect. The expectations are just too high.
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