Thursday, February 09, 2006

Thirteen again

Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen Things I hated about The Da Vinci Code


"A book so bad it makes bad books look good." Author Salman Rushdie

1. The beginning was unbelievable, terrible, and it went downhill from there.

2. The writing was awful. Awful. Maybe a step above 'See Jane Run.' But not much above it.

3. The heroine loved her grandfather - but flipped out when she saw him during a strange ritual - and didn't speak to him for TEN YEARS and never demanded an explanation. The reason that Sophie Neveu disassociated herself from her grandfather is that she witnessed him participating in a pagan sex ritual at his home in Normandy, when she made a surprise visit there during a break from college. Well, didn't anyone tell her it was rude to drop in unnanounced??

4. The hero didn't see the mirror image writing. That was the stupidest puzzle and he couldn't figure it out.

5. The whole plot revolved around women and their place in the Catholic church - but in the end it just fizzled.

6. The docent at Rosslyn Chapel is giving a guided tour of Rosslyn Chapel to Langdon and Neveu when he sees the rosewood box they are carrying and realizes that it seems to be an exact duplicate of a box owned by his grandmother, who is the head of the trust that oversees the chapel. He is revealed to be Sophie's brother.
Brother and sister? Gag gag!

7. Trying to make St. John into a woman in the Last Supper painting was really dumb.

8. After being shot in the stomach, The grandfather (who the heorine won't speak to) uses the last minutes of his life to arrange a series of clues for his estranged granddaughter Sophie to unravel the mystery of his death and preserve the secret kept by the Priory of Sion. When you are shot in the stomach, you usually go into shock and die a painful death.

9. The plot claims that the Catholic Church has been involved in a conspiracy to cover up the true story of Jesus. This implies that the Vatican consciously knows it is living a lie, but does so to keep itself in power. But at the end of the book, nothing is ever done about this.

10. The true identity thing, the church trynig to kill the little children so they were separated at birth made me gag too. Did this guy watch too many episodes of Star Wars??

11. Dan Brown put this in the beginning of the book: "Fact: (...) All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate."
All I can say is "Bull Shit!"

12. The claim The Mona Lisa is actually a self-portrait by Leonardo as a woman made me go "Huh?"

13. The book's 'revelation' that the Holy Grail is the bloodline sprung from an apocryphal union between Jesus and Mary Magdalene which has been characterized by many textual and historical scholars as being both highly unlikely and not an original idea of Brown. I'd heard about that before. *yawn* So what?

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!
1. Kate Rothwell
http://katerothwell.blogspot.com/
2. Douglas Hoffman
http://ballsandwalnuts.com/?p=40#comments
3. Jona's Thirteen
http://doibloodycare.blogspot.com/2006/02/thursday-again.html


Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!



11 comments:

Wynn Bexton said...

Thanks. You just saved me from reading the book. (Not that I have time to but now I won't bother.)

Sam said...

If you really feel you must - borrow it from the library. It's an expensive book, and the paper would have been better off used for toilet paper rolls.
LOL

Douglas Hoffman said...

I knew there was a reason I'd never read this.

Oh, yeah -- it's because my brother recommended it. The man thought Sam Kinison was a genius. Nuff said.

Here's mine:

Doug's thirteen.

Tara Marie said...

7. Trying to make St. John into a woman in the Last Supper painting was really dumb.

I had an argument with a girlfriend this past Wednesday about just this. She insisted it was Mary Magdellan [sp?] I finally gave up, smiled and nodded.

Sam said...

Doug - I really wish I hadn't read it only because all I could remember afterwards was the price.
Argh.
Tara Marie, sometimes you just can't argue with people, lol.

Jim Donahue said...

Yeah. Just awful. When people tell me they like this book, my opinion of them automatically goes down a notch.

Jona said...

There's someone who keeps on at me about reading this book, I knew I was avoiding it for a reason, lol.

In the words of Holy Moly 'Everyone has a great book in them. Except Dan Brown.' I know I shouldn't find that as funny as I do ;o)

Virenda said...

I haven't had the chance to read it, and I wasn't ever going too. Honestly the whole idea of the book put me off to begin with. Thanks for the wrap up though, lol at least I'm minimally informed.

First time at your site, have to give it a look through.

Have a nice weekend...

Sam said...

So far I've had nothing but comments from people who never read the book - do you think hte sales' numbers were inflated??
LOL
I think I was the only person to actually Buy the damn thing. (thinking of all the chocolate I could have bought instead...)
Of course, a rabid fan may come over and put my list right up there with the cartoons about Mohammed...

Wynn Bexton said...

Sam, I wanted to try the 13 thing but I'm so computer daft I can't figure out how to do it. Duh!

Anyway, great book review. (I am so far behind in pleasure reading that I often feel 'guilty', being a writer myself. But now I know why I don't always rush out and buy the so-called 'best sellers')

Sam said...

Hi Wynn,
I just posted the code into my post - not into the blog model.
When you write your post, just cut and copy the code into it.
Then replace the title with whatever you want.
(is this clear? LOL)