Finished The Da Vinci Code a few minutes ago, and not a minute too soon. Reading it was like listening to an know-it-all relate the story of a Jerry Bruckheimer film without a time limit. Consider:

”... Langdon noted with uneasiness that these particular cloisters lived up to their Latin ties to the word claustrophobic.”

Do you know anyone who talks like this all the time? Do you like to spend time with this person? There are whole pages of discussions of things like the golden ratio and fibonacci sequences that come off as masturbatory. Plot twists and puzzle solutions are condescendingly telegraphed with marquee lights pages ahead of time as if reaffirming the idea that Langdon (and by extension, Dan Brown) is just that much smarter than the reader.

Still, I’ve no-one to blame but myself. Despite the silly plot and tone I still stayed up late and finished the whole thing, if only to witness unbelievable moments such as three supposed Da Vinci scholars staring at a “code” of clearly-reversed cursive lettering and not recognizing what was going on. That’s not all of it, however — I guess I’m a bit of a sheep after all.

Summary? Let’s just say that it was about as entertaining as National Treasure with 3x the time investment.

It’s possible that I’m just feeling annoyed at a book that has yet to be released in paperback after two years in print. I doubt it, though. Thank goodness for the library — where I also picked up some Mishima as a palate cleanser.