The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

528 Pages (Fiction) Hardcover

After reading the Malazan series of books I was looking for a light read that would entertain. A friend had given me the book after finishing it and I enjoyed Angels and Demons and The Davinci Code. I wasn't expecting a lot out of the book. I was expecting a quick read that wouldn't challenge me much. I got what I was expecting.

Brown follows a similar path as his other books I have read. Robert Langdon is invited to give a last minute speech in Washington D.C. He arrives and is quickly drawn into a mystery that requires him to decode various clues hidden throughout the architecture and artwork around Washington. He becomes a suspect of the CIA and is being cajoled by members of the Masons to find the Masons Pyramid. The pyramid is supposedly hidden somewhere in Washington and hidden at the bottom of a great stairway. It holds the secrets of history.

I am sure many will disagree with me, but Dan Brown is not a very good writer. He is adept at coming up with a story and he is good at researching his subjects. His most appealing ability is taking all of these real historical artifacts and connecting them together. What he fails at is good writing. He is very bland and almost a slave to the minimum amount of language to tell a story. One thing that bothers me the most is the way he structures his chapters. The book is a little over 500 pages and there are over 130 chapters. That means chapters average about four pages. FOUR PAGES! Are we in elementary school? Start that with half a page displaying the chapter number and half of the last page blank and the book is really only about 300 pages. Brown tries very hard to leave each chapter with a mini cliff hanger that encourages the reader to read the next page. I think the biggest draw of Brown's writing is that a reader can tear through a 500 page book in a week and feel good about it themselves.

I think maybe my biggest issue with the book and maybe the genre in general is that it is supposed to be a mystery, but the reader isn't given a chance to solve it. A story is made and a line from point a to z is made. Brown takes you on this path for an adventure, but the reader is purely a spectator and never a part of the story.

I do have to admit that I was drawn into the book and did get pleasure out of devouring a book in a few days. That said I still can't recommend it to others.

3 Intellectual/Emotional - I didn't care about the characters and though parts of the history are interesting; over all it was spoon fed to me. The only redeeming quality is the historical and art connections. I typically drew up a picture of the work in question and looked at it along with the characters.

2 Style/Readability - It was extremely readable, but not in a good way.

2 Long Term Impact - Dan Brown has sold millions of books. He is popular around the world. He is bound to have impact on work that comes in the future. Let's hope this is a example of what not to do.

7 out of 13. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone. I enjoyed Angels and Demons and The Davinci Code, you would be better rewarded reading them or some other books.

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The Crippled God by Steven Erikson

913 pages (Fantasy Fiction) Trade Paperback

Entire series 7705 pages paperback

This is the 10th and final book in the Tale of the Malazan Book of the Fallen series. Yeah, that is a mouthful. This will be a review of the entire series and not so much the final book. The final two books are intended to be one story. Where to start?  The only thing I have heard of to compare it to is Roman and Greek stories and history. The plans of gods battle each other over thousands of years. Huge armies push themselves to the very limits. Tales spawn tales that spawn tales within tales.

One of the most unique things about Erickson is he is not only telling an overarching story that spans the entirety of the books, but within each story there are more stories to be told. From the first to the second book only a very few characters overlap. You read a book about a familiar world where all of your fantasy based assumptions are turned on their side. Armies of undead warriors travel the world protecting it from an ancient evil and they are the good guys. Karsa Orlong, a giant teblor, goes into the world to prove himself. The modern world wraps him in chains and drags him kicking and bellowing into a hated society. A woman, Tavore Paran,  gives absolutely everything on the hope that maybe it just might hold the world together...at least for a bit longer. Her brother, Ganoes Paran, becomes a pawn of the gods and is drawn into a game that he is then forced to play. The Bonehunters and the Bridgeburners battle across the entire planet and we experience their failures and their triumphs!

What might keep this epic story from being herald around the world as the greatest books ever? It is beyond dense and complex. It would take the almost 8000 pages of the books to make it clear exactly how complex. There are hundreds of characters in a multitude of story lines that jump back and forth in time, but also into other dimensions. The magic in the story derives from other planes that magic users can tap into. I imagine it like they are opening a whole to another dimension and using the force of that place to affect the world they live in. The gods are fighting over control of these, warrens, as they are called. 

I am giving you an overview from what I have pieced together over reading the books. Nothing is presented to you in the way I have just told you. As a reader you are dropped into the stories almost as if you are participating. This is great in that it makes you become a part of the story and it is easy to "get used" to what is happening in the books. Its drawback is that nothing is explained in a linear fashion. It is assumed you already know the references so things that are important are not elaborated on until the next chapter, or book, or 5 books later, or maybe not at all. New characters are constantly introduced. Each book sort of stands alone. They have a "Tale" that is told, but it is in the same world as the other books and as they go along you see the story lines start to come together. At the end of The Crippled God all of the stories from the ten books all start to converge on one event. 

Erikson asks a lot of his reader. He gives you bits and pieces and then convinces you to get interested in something new. This is what really shines for me about Erikson. YOU DO get interested. I can't say how many times I was drawn on another side path to the story and I quickly fell in with the new characters. I won't say that every story drew all of my interests and to be honest there were a few that I liked less than the others. The over all tone of the series is dark and brooding. Many of the characters are facing the greatest challenges of their times; and that is difficult. Then there were moments of joy and humor. Tragedy certainly plays a role for some characters, but later it is relieved with hope and success. 

It really is the most difficult writing I have ever read. I felt challenged and more than ever and had to re read things to make sure I understood what was going on. Even now after having read everything I can't claim to know a lot more than just the basic way things are connected to each other. I imagine there is a lot that I have missed. The Crippled God was about 900 pages and it took me about 3 months to read all together. To contrast that I have started reading The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown and have almost 100 pages read in 2 days. Erickson packs every paragraph full. Everything feels thought out to the extreme. Everything feels real even though most of the time these things are impossible or fantastic. He continually has story vignettes where maybe a few people meet, in the desert, at a bar, on the battle field and it makes an image appropriate for a painting. Looking back and thinking about the series I see these images of epic moments throughout the books.

Honestly, I am overwhelmed. It is certainly a masterwork of writing. I think anybody that reads it would agree.

These ratings are for the entire series.

5 Emotional/Intellectual - I became attached to a surprising number of characters. Every time I finished a book, I knew it was only a matter of time before I read the next one. Just reading the books is an intellectual challenge in itself so I had to ready to read one.

3 Style/Readability - I love his style. The way he uses language to express emotions from despair and anger to calmness and bliss is amongst the best I have read. The books are a difficult undertaking and so dense many would be turned away and at times it was very slow going.

3 Long Term Impact - Erikson has made something that others can hope to accomplish. I really don't see this becoming a huge bestseller ever. I do think that people that love fantasy enough to become writers ARE going to read this and it will inspire great things in the future. 

11 out of 13 feels right to me. I have read nothing like it and I don't really see how I ever will. I could compare it to Robert Jordan in terms of epicness, but I don't feel Jordan even comes close. To read this you must be looking for a huge tale that is going to take you years to read. A place you can enjoy that comes with a requirement of dedication and effort. I am glad that I read it and I have a feeling at some point I will start to read these again, but for now I am going to burn through some other books. 

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