BOOK REVIEW #3: Angels and Demons (and The Da Vinci Code)

First Edition Book Cover

Ambigram: It Spells the same when you read it upside down

Illuminati seal as depicted in the book

First Element: Earth

Second Element: Air

Third Element: Fire

Fourth Element: Water

The 5th Seal: All elements altogether spelled inverted. (Read it using a mirror)

This is what it look like.

Upon reading this second book of Dan’s Brown (the first is Digital Fortress, the one I intend to read upon writing this review) it remind me of his fourth book The Da Vinci Code (DVC). I’ve read that one (of course an ebook copy), back on 2005. If the Da Vinci Code uniqueness were all about signs, symbols and anagram and the essence of purpose ‘to devastate the very foundation of Christianity’ (as the author claimed), this one is not far different from it (bear in mind this is the book that came before Da Vinci Code).

In both DVC and AAD, story plots framed in the same repetitive pattern, involving same individual Robert Langdon, Harvard’s Professor of Symbology, with vast knowledges in religions, ancient architecture, renaissance personalities etc. He was called to assist in unexpected cryptic homicides and it was then the story began. Plotlines similarities of the stories blueprint described below.

a) The kick off point usually is some sort of murder left with cryptic signs. In DVC is the murder of Jacques Sauniere; Museum Curator (Master of Priory of Sion a decendent of Knight Templar) which lay dead in a position of Leonardo Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man and also a pentacle draw on a chest together with the message of 13-3-2-21-1-1-8-5 (a Fibronacci Sequence that becomes password to the high security Swiss bank) together with the phrase ‘O draconian devil, O lame saint’ which scrambled into ‘Leonardo da Vinci, Mona Lisa’. Message written on Monalisa painting was ‘So dark the con of man’ which later spells into another Da Vinci’s painting Madonna of the Rocks which give out Fleur-de-lis key that finally leads to the device used to store important secret named as cryptex, stated as designed by Da Vinci himself. In AAD, Leonardo Vetra, a particle physicist of CERN had his chest burned with the mark with Illumminati ambigram. His eyes gouged and removed and his head twisted 180 degrees.

b) Both book held background of Christian history and conspiracy theories which also recurring. DVC is about the Holy Grail (San grael) which upon repositioning will later spells Sang rael define as Royal Blood. Jesus was believed to be married to Mary Magdalene (in which the Council of Nicaea preposterously claimed as prostitute), fathering a child and his descendent survived until now. This theory first debated in a book titled Holy Blood, Holy Grail (written by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh and Henry Lincoln) which inspired Dan Brown to write DVC. The theory incited by enigmatic Da Vinci’s painting The Last Supper in which the chalice sign were interpreted. In AAD, Illuminati (an Italy word for Illumination) the secret society of scientists that held their old-century resentment towards the church for murdering the man of science back to the day when the church rules. The peak of incidence said to be the persecution of Galileo Galilei poisoned with hashish (hemlock). The quest impelled by Galileo’s last folio writing, Diagramma also Gian Lorenzo Bernini buildings architectural and statues as the signs throughout the quest.

c) Next similarity is a sidekick happens to be women who are related to the dead. These women play non-conventional role instead of being the traditional helpless source of conflict and trouble. They were actually a heroin who will save the protagonist at the perilous time when the hero least expecting. Vittoria Vetra in AAD the adopted daughter of Leonardo Vetra and Sophie Neveu the granddaughter of Jacques Sauniere in DVC.

d) Another similarity, there are some authority who will complicate and slowing down (to halt) the quest for answer. Commander Olivetti and Captain Elias Rocher in AAD and Detective Bezu-Fasche in DVC.

e) Both books also shared some shocking fact about Christian history and Pope and their malevolence act (past or present) that mould the motive of the story.

f) In addition, presence of some kind of strong psychotic killer hired and ordered to do dirty jobs of killing and retrieving things. In DVC, Silas, the albino monks who were extremely devout Christian (who practices sadistic act of coporal mortification – to reminds them how Jesus suffer and not to succumbs to human lusting desires) ordered to find the keystone. On the other hand, in AAD he is called the Hassassin, a Muslim Arab with motivation of antique hostility since Crusade War hired to kill the Preferiti, four favorite cardinals one to be chosen as Supreme Pontiff (a.k.a Pope).

g) Repetitive pattern of involvement of secret organization were also inevitable evident shared by these books. The Priory of Sion and Opus Dei in DVC; Illuminati and Freemason in AAD.

h) The difficulty deciphering code or some written clue that require reference and flashbacks. Not forgetting dead ends due to misinterpretation and retracement. In DVC the clue is in a poem-form or some rhyming phrases found written on parchment inside the cryptex also the rosewood wood box that held it, while the poem is in Galieleo’s folio Diagramma in AAD.

i) Location and involvement of ancient architectural signs in some foreign country as for Louvre Museum, of France in DVC and St. Peter Basilica of Vatican City in AAD.

j) Association of clue to the ancient well-known artists involved. Leonardo Da Vinci in DVC; Galileo and Bernini in AAD.

k) Both quests are one way or another actually comparable to treasure hunt (that reminds me of least successful movie National Treasure).

l) Both shared the antagonists that appear to be involved in inside treachery. A person who at first looks dependable and trustworthy that turned out to be the mastermind of all evil-doing. Maximillian Kohler and Rocher in AAD were a black sheep; and Sir Leigh Teabing in DVC. Camerlegno Carlo Ventresca in AAD was a devout man, no question about it. This is one of the most brilliant modus operandi I have ever read. Too Machiavellian to read. You’ll be surprised from the first page to the end. One surprise after another. After all, it was the chamberlain who held the key and glued the puzzle clues together.

I sensed somehow, the character of Kohler in AAD is mimicry of Stephen Hawking in real life, the world renowned physicist who proposed the theory of black hole.

m) Both stories offer some eye-opening and mind-blowing facts that came knocking to your head in a way of revelation. The readers should expect to be dumbfounded. Surplus elements of surprise.

Although lack story plot and pattern originality, AAD and DVC in some way not only entertaining but also educational to read. If DVC is clear-cut offensive that raised debates among Christians, it’s scholar and authority (the Vaticans) regarding its facts authenticity, AAD is obtrusively a cynical book that critique devout Christian while somehow look like upholding it. What intrigued (double-entendre alert) me of AAD was, the ambigrams were created cleverly it was the main attraction to me from the early pages of this book (kudos to John Langdon). It was something that hooked you from the beginning foretelling you that this book is something interesting to venture into.

The most interesting of all for me was towards the end of the book, I figured out what the meaning of the 6th Brand before I even came to the part which explains it. I knew it when I saw the ambigram is somewhat unique and undecipherable unlike others, written in a way strange. But suddenly it crossed my mind that maybe it was inverted, a backword. So I took the MP4 that was charged by the cable to the USB port of my laptop. My MP4 have mirror-like reflective back so I positioned it closed by my laptop screen, only then I figured out the ambigram is actually:

EARTH
AIR FIRE
WATER

Never before had I come across the book with such interactive contents. It lets the reader see for themselves the picture and run your own investigation on it.

These books can be classified as semi-fiction. Both book written after some extreme careful research so it is somehow a reference-book-worthy for something religious not only for Christians but also Muslim, we evidently can learn something especially for those who are into Theology.

Brave and engaging. 4 and a half stars. I truly suggest you to read. It will be helpful if you understood a basic knowledge about Christian biblical background, histories and terms also some ancient architectural vocabularies. Christology is something interesting to learn, not in the mean of converting your faith but in the motion to strengthen our very foundation of belief.

I anticipated the movie will be worth waiting for on 19 May 2009. I can’t wait for it.

Interesting facts from the book

• Halos like most of Christian symbology were borrowed from ancient Egyptian religion of sun worship. Christianity is filled with example of sun worship. Even images of Christ had often pictured with circle of light behind his head. The light is indeed the sun.
  
• According to the Bible, Christ was born in March, but Christian celebrates his birth on 25th December. It originally was the ancient pagan holiday of sol invictus (unconquered sun) coinciding with winter solstice.
  
• Conquering religion often adopt existing holiday to make conversion less shocking. It’s called transmutation. It helps people acclimatize to the new faith. Worshippers keep the same holy dates, pray in the same sacred locations, use a similar symbology…and they simply substitute a different God.
  
• When the early Christian converts abandoned their former deities – pagan gods, Roman gods, Greek, sun, Mithraic, whataver- they asked the church what their new Christian God looked like. Wisely the church chose the most feared, powerful and most familiar face in all of recorded history…Zeus.