Angels & Demons

The movies coming out so I figured I'd dust off my favorite Dan Brown novel and give it another read.  No plot details here, just some thoughts...

* I really enjoy stories about secret societies, makes the world seem more exciting

* I want to be an Illuminatus

* After watching "The Passion of the Christ", reading this novel and enjoying the works of Khalid Hosseini, I've come to realize that religion leads to a remarkable amount of violence

* Although a lot of the science makes no sense to me, wouldn't it be nice if anti-matter were a legitimate fuel source

* Tom Hanks was an excellent choice for Robert Langdon

* The movies will always be pale in comparison to Dan Brown's novels, there's just too much information to be processed in 120 minutes of film time

* Ambigrams are cool

* I'm excited to see Ewan McGregor play the Carmelengo

* Is there really a secret vault of archives for the Vatican that contains all these rare materials?  Wouldn't surprise me.

This novel kept me guessing the whole way.  I love Dan Brown novels but they are all very predictable from my POV.  Angels and Demons is my favorite because it is the only one that I read in which I did not guess the villain prior to his unveiling.  Here's hoping the movie will outdo the Da Vinci Code.

Overall Score: 8/10

Artemis Fowl

So I just read the first two books of the Artemis Fowl series.  Artemis Fowl and The Arctic Incident were both very quick reads as they are basically young adult books.  While reading some more serious books (Mengele, Middlesex), it's nice to relax and quickly burn some Harry Potter-esque materials.

Some basic background on Artemis Fowl is that he is a criminal genius.  However, he is only twelve years old.  His family has been broken apart by the disappearance of his father and he is trying to bring them back into the 'billionaire' status by taking advantage of the fairy world.  They are called 'The People' in this series.  Fairies, goblins, trolls, etc all have gifts that humans don't have and advanced technology.  These stories are based off the interaction of Fowl and The People.

Some cool things about the novels are the fact that the hero is actually a villain, who you grow to appreciate.  He definitely prefers to be underhanded but somehow, good comes out of him at the end of the books in small doses.  Also, the description of the various fairy world characters are quite amusing and the devices that they have are just remarkable.  The action sequences are very exciting and the book goes by so quickly because of how fun the scenes are.

I don't feel the need to actually go into what each novel is about in depth but the first is Fowl's attempt to re-establish his family fortune by stealing from The People; the second is about Fowl helping The People stop a human/fairy trading group as well as the recovery of his father.  I would say the first book is more interesting but both were definitely entertaining.

For me, the enjoyment of reading these books comes from the visualization of an alternate world.  I wouldn't look to learn anything too deep from these books.  The one lesson I did "learn" is that humans are slowly destroying the world.  I already knew this but it's sad to see that it has even become a topic in our kids' books.  There is a constant berating of the filthy "mud people" which is fairy-talk for humans.

All-in-all, these books were amusing enough for me to want to read the whole series.  Hopefully I'll be able to find them at a Barnes or Borders so I can just take an hour or two to read them.

Overall Score: 7/10