Title: The Da Vinci Code

Author: Dan Brown

Pages: 592

Hi all,

It was by coincidence that I spotted this book in the book cabinet in our town that allowed me to borrow it. My first contact with the story was when the movie came out and afforded a completely different kind of adventure than the others we are used to. Generally the adventure novels are historical, or somewhere in the outdoors.

This book’s adventure was more intellectual and historical.

Professor Langdon is in Paris and held an event on his field of study: symbiology. He is woken late at night in his hotel room by a local police officer, requiring him to come and assist them on a case that occurred in the Louvre Museum that night.

The museum’s historian / art executive (Jacques Sauniere) has been found dead and lay in an odd position. They have called on him to give his alibi since the deceased person’s diary noted that they should have had a meeting that night. Langdon agrees but clarifies that their meeting never took place. The head of the investigation Bezu Fache enquires with Langdon to help him understand the message that Jacques wrote on the floor in his own blood and why he has positioned himself in a specific way, resembling Leonardo Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. During the interview, an officer with the cryptology department, Sophie Neveu, arrives to the scene and states what they could make out with the code. She also hands Langdon her phone, telling him that his embassy had requested of him to call back.

He takes the call, only to realize that it was a recorded message from Sophie to him. She informs him that he is in danger and that he should excuse himself to the bathrooms in a few minutes so they could have a talk. After Sophie’s update to the chief inspector she leaves the two along once again. Langdon then excuses himself to freshen up.

In the bathrooms she informs him that some part of the message written on the floor had been erased, which included his name. Therefore, he is their main suspect. They then take the tracker from his pocket and throw it out of the window, which then lands on the back of a truck and drives off. The police rush out and are after them.

Sophie and Langdon head back to the location of her grandfather and try to solve the puzzle that was left in the message on the floor. They search for double meanings in the message and then find out that it leads to a specific painting in the room, where a key has been hidden. Shortly after, they flee the scene and evade the museum security guard that had almost managed to stop them.

The police have tracked down the truck and found, that it only contained the tracker and not their suspect. Therefore, they head back to the museum. However, Sophie and Langdon have left and leave for the train station, buy tickets and then flee with her car once again, hoping to win some time.

On the key they discovered another hidden message which leads them to the location to where the key fits. It is a well-hidden Swiss Bank in Paris for exclusive clients. There, they are invited in and are directed to the room where clients use their keys to they boxes. The key is only one part of the security feature. The second is another code, which, after some time, they discover to be the code that was written on the floor in the museum.

They retrieve their box and find it contains a cryptex. Unfortunately, when they entered the bank, the security on guard identified their faces with the local wanted list and informed Interpol of their location. The head of the bank, Andre Vernet, takes them to the basement of the building where their armoured trucks are stationed and drives them out of the facility.

On their way, Andre stops in the woods and at gun point requests them to hand over the property they have retrieved. He makes it clear that his client was Jacques Sauniere and he merely wishes to retrieve the item that they have stolen. However, they overpower him and drive off. Their next destination is Chateau Villette, owned by Sir Leigh Teabing, someone that Langdon once met at an event and found to be a enthusiast for something called ‘The Holy Grail”.

They make their way to his place and he welcomes them in. They tell him of their discoveries that night and he gladly offers to help them since their current discovery would likely solve his quest to find the Grail as well.

Later, they find out that the police have tracked the truck from the bank, so they flee with Teabing’s Range Rover through the forest and head for the airport, to make their way to England. The place where they believe the riddle wants them to go to. In England they head to one church and try to isolate the place in the Temple Church where the riddle could be referencing to.

However, this is where they are held at gunpoint by a delusional monk (Silas) that has been following from the beginning. He was responsible for killing the four main keepers of the Priory of Sion group. Sophie’s grandfather being their leader. He had followed them to the Chateau Villette but had been overpowered and taken with them to England as a captive. He had gotten loose and was now demanding the cryptex from them. When they decline his demand, Teabing’s butler enters from the shadow and reinforces Silas’ claim. They hand it over after Teabing is taken as a hostage and are left alone.

Not knowing what to do without the cryptex they decide that the best way to avoid the secret being revealed to Silas is to find the correct church before them and hopefully get another clue there. This leads them to go to the library and undertake some research before finally solving the riddle and head to the correct church, to the crypt of Sir Isaac Newton.

Here, they find the crypt and are then reunited with a former acquaintance. It appears that this individual was not as innocent as they seemed and had been the one that had financially supported the people that had sent Silas to retrieve the relics that would help to reveal the Holy Grail. Langdon and Sophie manage to overpower the individual and fortunately simultaneously the local police arrive, together with Bezu Fache, who informs them that the suspicion on Langdon was taken back since they had received a statement that proved another individual had been responsible.

Langdon and Sophie together continue to solve the riddle which takes them to Edinburgh.

Langdon then leaves for Paris. During the night he is disturbed by the last riddle they had found in Edinburgh, which makes him head to the Louvre once again. There, he discovers what he had not made sense of earlier but now made perfect sense.

Summary:

A completely different kind of an adventure, but definitely worthwhile. Therefore, the book receives a rating of 4.1/5.