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It takes guts to write a novel that combines an ancient secret brotherhood, the Swiss Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire, a papal conclave, mysterious ambigrams, a plot against the Vatican, a mad scientist in a wheelchair, particles of anti-matter, jets that can travel 15,000 miles per hour, crafty assassins, a beautiful Italian physicist and a Harvard professor of religious iconology. It takes talent to make that novel anything but ridiculous. Kudos to Dan Brown (Digital Fortress) for achieving the nearly impossible. Angels and Demons is a no-holds-barred, pull-out-all-the-stops, breathless tangle of a thriller--think Katherine Neville's The Eight (but cleverer) or Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum (but more accessible). Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is shocked to find proof that the legendary secret society, the Illuminati--dedicated since the time of Galileo to promoting the interests of science and condemning the blind faith of Catholicism--is alive, well, and murderously active. Brilliant physicist Leonardo Vetra has been murdered, his eyes plucked out and the society's ancient symbol branded upon his chest. His final discovery, anti-matter, the most powerful and dangerous energy source known to man, has disappeared--only to be hidden somewhere beneath Vatican City on the eve of the election of a new pope. Langdon and Vittoria, Vetra's daughter and colleague, embark on a frantic hunt through the streets, churches and catacombs of Rome, following a 400-year-old trail to the lair of the Illuminati, to prevent the incineration of civilisation. Brown seems as much juggler as author--there are lots and lots of balls in the air in this novel, yet Brown manages to hurl the reader headlong into an almost surreal suspension of disbelief. While the reader might wish for a little more sardonic humour from Langdon and a little less bombastic philosophising on the eternal conflict between religion and science, these are less fatal flaws than niggling annoyances--readers should have no trouble skimming past them and immersing themselves in a heck of a good read. "Brain candy" it may be, but it's tasty. --Kelly Flynn, Amazon.com
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When a world renowned scientist is found brutally murdered in a Swiss research facility, a Harvard professor, Robert Langdon, is summoned to identify the mysterious symbol seared onto the dead man's chest. His baffling conclusion: it is the work of the Illuminati, a secret brotherhood presumed extinct for nearly four hundred years - reborn to continue their bitter vendetta against their sworn enemy, the Catholic church.
In Rome, the college of cardinals assembles to elect a new pope. Yet somewhere within the walls of the Vatican, an unstoppable bomb of terrifying power relentlessly counts down to oblivion. While the minutes tick away, Langdon joins forces with Vittoria Vetra, a beautiful and mysterious Italian scientist, to decipher the labyrinthine trail of ancient symbols that snakes across Rome to the long-forgotten Illuminati lair - a secret refuge wherein lies the only hope for the Vatican.
But with each revelation comes another twist, another turn in the plot, which leaves Langdon and Vetra reeling and at the mercy of a seemingly invisible enemy...
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The Illuminati were, allegedly, a secret society of artists and proto-scientists suppressed by the Church during the Counter-Reformation; they have featured in paranoid theories and thrillers ever since. Art historian Langdon is called in when a leading nuclear physicist is robbed, murdered and mutilated; along with the scientist's beautiful adopted daughter Vittoria, he finds himself involved in a treasure hunt against time. A lethal assassin has kidnapped four cardinals to torture them to death, and has planted an anti-matter bomb in the Vatican--at midnight, the Papal Conclave and the Sistine Chapel and the whole of Vatican City will go up in a flash of light, the vengeance of the Illuminati. Full of loopy conspiracy lore and some radical reinterpretations of the history of art and architecture, Angels and Demons is a switchback ride whose occasional absurdities never for a second reduce its high-adrenaline intensity. The bookish, brave Langdon, the clever Vittoria, the saintly young papal chamberlain who becomes their principal ally, the venal and yet oddly savvy BBC stringer who starts getting the killer's communiqués--all of these are involving and attractive characters who make us care about people and issues as much as we do about an ingenious plot. --Roz Kaveney
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