The mysteries in Deception Point are around NASA. As in all other Dan’s
books the characters in this book are also copies of encyclopedias. I
wonder from where he gets all smart people who solve big mysteries with
small clues. Rachel Sexton the daughter of a Presidential nominee an
intelligence agent is called to verify the authenticity of a meteoroid that
NASA discovers in the depths of the icy Arctic Ocean. The discovery proved
that there exists life on planets other than on earth as there was a fossil
of an insect buried on the rock. Everybody was proud of NASA’s victory.
Experts proved that the rock is extraterrestrial. Just before they are
about to share the results Michael Tolland a famous oceanographer and
Rachel discover a deadly deception in the discovery. In this novel Rachel
plays the role of Robert Langdon. Rachel and Michael go hunting for the
truth. Some of their friends who were involved in testing the authenticity
of the rock lose their lives in the trial. There are lots of twists as to
who is behind the plot at every turning point. The motive behind the plot
is fame and political gain. Towards the end all the missing piece of
information is intelligently arranged at the correct places. Rachel and
Michael cross all the big hurdles and finally put forth the truth before
the public. The genius brains with all the information they have about
outer space, earthly object, oceanology, blah blah blah decipher each code.
The book was quite thought provoking.

This book is woven around the Masons and Noetic Science. Dan tries to
explain that religious implications of miracles are possible through
Science. Science and religion are the same however religion teaches
mankind, Science does not teach one to be a good human being. Dan describes
Masons as not a secret society but a society with secrets. At certain
places I found the description quite scary with lots of skulls and bones.
Malakh the villain in this story also looked dangerous. The book mainly
talks of ancient wisdom as the hidden treasure and through science we are
rediscovering the lost knowledge that our ancestors already possessed. The
story is about one family “The Solomon’s” who are considered as one of the
wealthiest family. Solomon is a freemason with a 33rd degree. Katherine his
sister is a scientist and her area of study is Noetic science. She conducts
and documents a number of experiments in her highly sophisticated lab
presented by her brother. Through an experiment of a dying man she proves
that there exist soul and is different from the body and the soul has mass.
The illuminati in the story is a prodigal son of Solomon who accepts wealth
for wisdom and choices his own way of living, later realizes he has made a
wrong choice and kidnaps his father to gain access to the ancient wisdom.
In this trail he cuts the hand of his father and displays it in a museum.
Robert Langdon is called to decipher the symbols and Katherine joins him in
tracing her missing brother. There are a lot of references to religion,
numerology, ancient history, Noetic science and physics. Freemasonry is
highly explained. The whole story is around Washington DC. Dan describes
Washington as not just a capital city but a place with hidden secrets.
This book held more suspense, than the other books I read. I didn’t like
the way it ended. When the secrets were revealed there were quite ordinary
things, there was nothing much surprising when compared to the plot to
acquire and safeguard it from going into the wrong hands. First half was
quite interesting. The religious term sacrifice is well explained. This
book is the third in Robert Langdon Series a continuation of Da Vinci Code.
This book was initially named “The Solomon’s Key” and was later renamed to
“The Lost Symbol”.

Angels and Demons was the first book written by Dan Brown that has invoked
conspiracies within the Catholic Church. The story is featured around Rome
and the Vatican City and focuses more on explaining the relation between
science and religion. This book also begins with a murder investigation of
Leonardo Vetra who was a catholic priest with an interest in science.
Leonardo Vetra along with his adopted daughter works on a life changing
experiment Big Bang in which they create a substance called Anti Matter
(opposite of Matter) which could become a powerful weapon. I found the
existence of Anti Matter quite ridiculous; however it went well with the
story. Verta was killed by illuminati and the canister containing
antimatter was stolen to destroy the Vatican City followed by a treat to
kill the four cardinals of the church one by one who were the most eligible
persons to become the Pope. Robert Langdon is called up to solve the puzzle
and to stop the disaster. In this book also we have an intelligent women
Victoria who wants to avenge her fathers death. It’s a suspenseful thriller
with lots of mysteries. Solving the mysteries require expertise in Art,
Science, Religion, Symbology etc. They are a few characters who creep in on
time, share critical information that help deciphering the codes and moving
the story forward. The regular Dan’s style of writing novels only the
puzzles and situations differ each time. Forgot to mention we have the
police also following right from the beginning creating hindrances to
Landgon’s move. This is also a part of Dan’s style of writing.

Da Vinci Code was the first book of Dan Brown that I read. It’s a
continuation of Angels and Demons though I read it in the reverse order.
The book begins with a brutal murder investigation and ends revealing the
secret behind the Holy Grail. There is good suspense hidden in the series
of puzzles, deciphering one opens a door for the next one. As you reach the
end the book Dan explains how Leonardo Da Vinci has hidden a secret of the
ancient times in his art “The Last Supper” to pass the information to
future generation. Sophia the main female character in the story learns
about her family line. The book was well written however it didn’t just
reveal the murder mystery instead was based around divine mystery that had
questioned faith of the multitudes. Hence it was not received well by the
critics and there are an enormous controversies raised as the story is
against the Roman Catholic faith. I diplomatically overlooked the
conspiracies it carried and considered it just as another story book. As a
friction thriller I would definitely rate it high. There is a lot of
research and intelligence that has gone into writing this book, there are
enough suspense’s to hold the attention of the readers till the end. Right
from the Fibonacci series to the truth the Holy Grail carried, the
deciphering of the code was quite interesting.  The description of the
places was awesome. Some simple things were well portrayed, in one
incidence Vernet the President at Swiss Bank while trying to help Langdon
and Sophie disguising himself as a truck driver get caught because of an
expensive watch on his hand. “Do all drivers wear Rolexes?” This was the
question asked by the agent; there had been many such interesting
conversations throughout the book. It has good references to numerology,
ancient history, art and literature. I enjoyed reading it. According to me
it’s definitely an interesting friction however far from facts and the
mistake done is presenting a friction as fact that to on a topic concerning
divinity a faith prophesied by several millions of people, over thousands
of generations reasoning the book being extensively denounced.

Recently I have read the book Digital Fortress written by Dan Brown. When
its novels I always have a Go for thrillers and Dan Brown is been my all
time favorites. I have read 5 of his books Angels & Demons, Da Vinci Code,
Lost Symbol, Deception Point and Digital Fortress. Here’s a quick review
about Digital Fortress. I will come up with the reviews of the other books
as well.

Digital Fortress was written during the outbreak of encryption/decryption in digital technology. To summarize the story goes
this way; the US National Security Agency NSA develops a code-breaking
machine called TRANSLTR that could break any code. NSA does not reveal
TRANSLTR's existence to the public. "Who will guard the guards", Ensei
Tankado a former NSA employee who was displeased with NSA for its intrusion
in people’s private lives develops an unbreakable algorithm called Digital
Fortress. The code somehow bypasses the NSA security firewall and TRANSLTR
runs for hours trying to break the unbreakable code. Though this was kept
as a top secret, the code running in TRANSLTR for more than 12 hours did
create chaoses among a few staff and each one start spying to find out
what’s happening. There are enough suspense’s and new twist as to who is
behind the plot as you turn your pages.

Important characters in the story are Susan Fletcher, David Becker, and
Strathmore. Employing a language professional as a detective agent to find
the pass key has been quite different and interesting. To know the exact
struggles involved in searching the pass key, breaking the unbreakable
code, what the code for Digital Fortress was actually meant for, the threat
it carried to NSA etc you must read the book.

It’s an excellent techno-thriller and the mysteries would keep holding till
you reach the last page. Like all other books of Dan this one also has deciphering
of code. There are references to technologies especially the network
security, firewalls, encryption/decryption and a slight reference to
history Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A techy who loves thrillers would enjoy
reading this book.

The novel “Only Time Will Tell” had killed two days of my time and here’s a
quick review of the book. The story revolves round two families, "The
Barringtons" and "The Cliftons" through some generations. It begins with
Harry Clifton’s, childhood around whom the entire story is bound who in the
beginning chapters says “I was told my father died in a war”. Time reveals
Harry, his own identity, How his father died? And the fact whether he was
his father or not? I am not going to put the entire summary as I wouldn't like
to reveal the suspense of the readers the author had hidden in his book. The
narrating art Jeffrey has used was quite impressive where each part of the
story was told by a different character without much of repetitiveness.
Each coming up with their point of view and also driving the story forward.
I loved the character of Old Jack throughout; all the other characters were
also equally good. Towards the end I felt the story ended abruptly, some of
the characters have gone missing, leaving the readers ambiguous on the
conclusion. I felt there should have been something more. This book is the
first part of “The Clifton Chronicles”. Hmm… need to wait for the next book
in this series.

While surfing I came across this book “Man’s Search For Meaning” written by Viktor Frankl. Inquisitive by the title I just started reading and let me tell you’ll it’s a wonderful book. The author who is a psychiatrist by profession writes his own experience in a concentration camp. He talks about the extreme suffering a Man can undergo in his life. He lost his entire family in the struggle and yet believes that there was something that life expected from him that kept him alive. The book has some beautiful quotes. People for no fault of theirs were imprisoned and treated as slaves and once they were found not fit to work they were sent to the gas chambers and burnt alive. They did not have the basic necessities of life like proper food, clothing and shelter. Yet, in the suffering they had a reason to be happy. They often imagined the world outside where they could have proper food, their dear ones and waited for the day to come when they were left free. Occasionally while working the author sees the image of his wife who had died in the prison, fading behind the dim lights of the sky . For the first time in his life he was able to understand the meaning of the words, "The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory."
-> Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.