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Angels & Demons | 
 enlarge | Author: Dan Brown
Publisher: Pocket
Category: Book
List Price: $9.99
Buy Used: $0.01
You Save: $9.98 (100%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  2183 reviews
Sales Rank: 6981
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 736
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 4.2 x 1.3
ISBN: 1416524797
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9781416524793
ASIN: 1416524797
Publication Date: March 28, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com Review
It takes guts to write a novel that combines an ancient secret brotherhood, the Swiss Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire, a papal conclave, mysterious ambigrams, a plot against the Vatican, a mad scientist in a wheelchair, particles of antimatter, jets that can travel 15,000 miles per hour, crafty assassins, a beautiful Italian physicist, and a Harvard professor of religious iconology. It takes talent to make that novel anything but ridiculous. Kudos to Dan Brown (Digital Fortress) for achieving the nearly impossible. Angels & Demons is a no-holds-barred, pull-out-all-the-stops, breathless tangle of a thriller--think Katherine Neville's The Eight (but cleverer) or Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum (but more accessible). Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is shocked to find proof that the legendary secret society, the Illuminati--dedicated since the time of Galileo to promoting the interests of science and condemning the blind faith of Catholicism--is alive, well, and murderously active. Brilliant physicist Leonardo Vetra has been murdered, his eyes plucked out, and the society's ancient symbol branded upon his chest. His final discovery, antimatter, the most powerful and dangerous energy source known to man, has disappeared--only to be hidden somewhere beneath Vatican City on the eve of the election of a new pope. Langdon and Vittoria, Vetra's daughter and colleague, embark on a frantic hunt through the streets, churches, and catacombs of Rome, following a 400-year-old trail to the lair of the Illuminati, to prevent the incineration of civilization. Brown seems as much juggler as author--there are lots and lots of balls in the air in this novel, yet Brown manages to hurl the reader headlong into an almost surreal suspension of disbelief. While the reader might wish for a little more sardonic humor from Langdon, and a little less bombastic philosophizing on the eternal conflict between religion and science, these are less fatal flaws than niggling annoyances--readers should have no trouble skimming past them and immersing themselves in a heck of a good read. "Brain candy" it may be, but my! It's tasty. --Kelly Flynn
Product Description
An ancient secret brotherhood. A devastating new weapon of destruction. An unthinkable target. World-renowned Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned to a Swiss research facility to analyze a cryptic symbol seared into the chest of a murdered physicist. What he discovers is unimaginable: a deadly vendetta against the Catholic Church by a centuries-old underground organization -- the Illuminati. Desperate to save the Vatican from a powerful time bomb, Langdon joins forces in Rome with the beautiful and mysterious scientist Vittoria Vetra. Together they embark on a frantic hunt through sealed crypts, dangerous catacombs, deserted cathedrals, and the most secretive vault on earth . . . the long-forgotten Illuminati lair. BEFORE THE DA VINCI CODE WAS BROKEN, THE WORLD LAY AT THE MERCY OF ANGELS & DEMONS
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| Customer Reviews: Read 2178 more reviews...
 Good Plot, Bad writing September 24, 2008
The book does a good job of keeping you interested in what will happen next, but... The character development is awful and unrealistic. The writing is simple and inartful. A fun time, but overall too simplistic and reaching.
 Good for a thrill or two September 15, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I hate to admit it, but I did buy a paperback version of "Angels and Demons" a number of years ago because the premise sounded intriguing. Particularly to the part of me that needed a quick thrill from "popular" fiction. What I got instead was book that is written for speed (not always a bad thing), but written in a kind of nerrative that consists of very short sentences, very short paragraphs, lots of dialogue, and not too many nerrative stretches. For someone with ADD that's fine, I mean this is hardly "literature".
However despite the initial interest the plot just got silly and tiresome as the hero was chasing or being chased (or whatever) all over the Vatican. Pretty soon all I was doing was skimming the book just to get to the end. After spending four hours all I got out of it was that (1) the Vatican has lots and lots of underground and hidden passages, (2) the closest character that came close to being three dimentional (and not to mention sympathetic) turned out to be the villain--aargh! and (3) people can actually survive falls from hovering helicopters--and that's the point where I just stopped reading and threw the book across the room...
(To make matters worse I actually paid good money to watch "The DaVinci Code" in the movie theater! But that's another story, and yes I did learn my lesson!)
One wonders how truly interesting this book would have turned out had Dan Brown been a more gifted writer. I am currently reading "The Power of the Dog" by Don Winslow, which also has short sentences, short paragraphs, and lots of dialogue. But my goodness! "The Power of the Dog" actually shows us how with the right author this technique can be powerfully effective and to the point; unlike "Angels and Demons" where it seemed like a cheap and easy way to keep the reader turning the pages since the choice of words and level of syntex is maintained at the most elementary level--and therefore not taxing the reader's brain at all.
So, I while can't call the book a pleasure (since ultimately it frustrated me), I do feel some guilt as I kept up (even skimming) with it for almost its entirety...
Angels and Demons Book Review September 9, 2008
Angels and Demons is Dan Brown's prequel to The DaVinci Code, taking place approximately one year before the events in his best selling novel. The incidents in this book are hinted at in The DaVinci Code and only help to whet the appetite, and this book does not disappoint.
Robert Langdon, a Harvard Symbologist, receives a mysterious phone call by the director of Switzerland's CERN, home of the Large Hadron Collider used to study antimatter. Langdon is flown to Geneva to meet with the director and is shown the horrific crime scene of a physicist murdered in his own room and a symbol burned into his chest. The symbol belongs to a lost brotherhood of scientists called the Illuminati who, several hundred years ago, swore vengeance against the Catholic church for stifling of scientific progress with religious doctrine.
The dead scientist was also a devout Catholic priest working on antimatter as a future energy source. Away on research during the murder, Vittoria Vetra, the priest's adopted daughter, returns home and enlightens the director and Langdon on her father's work, discovering a dangerously large sample of antimatter is missing from the lab. A phone call from Rome adds to the mystery when the missing container of antimatter is seen in a security camera of the Vatican with no clue to its location. Langdon and Vetra are sent to the Vatican to assist in locating the canister but are suddenly caught up in a bomb threat made by the Illuminati.
Langdon's expertise is put to the test as him and Vetra race through Rome trying to solve hidden clues leading to the secret Illuminati lair to find the murderer and hopefully the bomb.
From the first page this book just does not let up. I finished this hefty tome in one weekend because I couldn't put it down, staying up all night until I could read by the light of the sun. This is an action novel, purely plot driven and fluid in its telling. As with The DaVinci Code, this book is not big on characterization. There is characterization but it isn't the focus of the book. As an action novel its main point is telling a fantastic story that drives the reader to the end without pause.
Again, I could not put this book down and the story is well conceived. The ending is just amazing and doesn't come off as contrived or artificial, everything makes sense and flows logically from one part of the story to the next. Dan Brown's storytelling is spot on and this book is definitely worth picking up.
Worth a Read August 20, 2008
It's definitely worth the read. I found it entertaining, but I'm not raving about it.
I confess that I got hooked... August 17, 2008
The story is very implausible. The characters are flat. I don't want to spoil anything, so no comment about the ending... You have to read to believe... Even so, I couldn't put this book down. Maybe Da Vinci Code is better. I don't know... They are in the same league. Highly entertaining.
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