Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
Published May 1st 2000
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 736
Source: Borrowed it
An ancient secret brotherhood.
A devastating new weapon of destruction.
An unthinkable target…
When world-renowned Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned to a Swiss research facility to analyze a mysterious symbol — seared into the chest of a murdered physicist — he discovers evidence of the unimaginable: the resurgence of an ancient secret brotherhood known as the Illuminati… the most powerful underground organization ever to walk the earth. The Illuminati has surfaced from the shadows to carry out the final phase of its legendary vendetta against its most hated enemy… the Catholic Church.
Langdon’s worst fears are confirmed on the eve of the Vatican’s holy conclave, when a messenger of the Illuminati announces he has hidden an unstoppable time bomb at the very heart of Vatican City. With the countdown under way, Langdon jets to Rome to join forces with Vittoria Vetra, a beautiful and mysterious Italian scientist, to assist the Vatican in a desperate bid for survival.
Embarking on a frantic hunt through sealed crypts, dangerous catacombs, deserted cathedrals, and even to the heart of the most secretive vault on earth, Langdon and Vetra follow a 400-year old trail of ancient symbols that snakes across Rome toward the long-forgotten Illuminati lair… a secret location that contains the only hope for Vatican salvation.
An explosive international thriller, Angels & Demons careens from enlightening epiphanies to dark truths as the battle between science and religion turns to war.
I feel like everyone and their mom have already read Angels and Demons, except me. Still, I read it and now I’m reviewing it, even though I’m a few years late to the party.
In this book, the Illuminati have re-surged and want to stop religious influence in science. A hired assassin kills Leonardo Vetra, an acclaimed CERN scientist whose main objective is to connect science and religion. The assassin also steals his most recent discovery, antimatter. Then, the Illuminati hide it in the Vatican, where it can only last 24 hours before it explodes, and kidnap the four preferiti, the four cardinals that are most likely to be elected Pope during the Conclave. To help solve Leonardo’s death, save the preferiti and prevent the destruction of the Vatican City, CERN’s director, Kohler, calls Robert Langdon, an expert symbologist, that travels to Rome with Leonardo Vetra’s daughter, Vittoria, another scientist that helped in the discovery of the antimatter. Together, they have to solve the ancient mysteries to save the Cardinals and discover the location of the antimatter before it explodes.
Let’s start with the characters. Robert Langdon, the main character, knew a lot about almost every topic. For this book, this kind of character was needed or else the Vatican would just blow up, but it wasn’t really realistic. Still, I enjoyed Langdon. He’s not someone I would ever meet in real life but someone whose knowledge I can admire.
Vittoria Vetra was the sexy female sidekick. She and her father created the antimatter and that was almost all she did in the novel. She also helps Langdon, of course, but her contribution to the flow of the plot is minimal. Her personality didn’t captivate me but she was still a good character.
The characters that Dan Brown completely nailed were the villains. They were brilliant, well-developed characters that made the book much better.
Now, the plot. The story was dense. There were several points of view but what really made me enjoy the book so much was the fact that there was always something relevant to the plot happening. The novel was action packed to the point where I got tired just from reading it.
Another aspect of the book that I absolutely loved was the fact that, as Langdon and Vittoria visited different monuments, the reader got to know its story and who designed them. Because of this book, I learned a lot about some of Rome’s monuments.
The one aspect of the book that bothered me was the fact that Langdon couldn’t help but fall in love with Vittoria, that was described as attractive and sexy, even though he’d only met her a few hours before. It perpetuates the idea that two people from opposite sexes can’t be only friends if they’re attractive, which is sad. I understand that the author wanted something light (such as romance) to compensate for the heavy plot but it just felt unnecessary.
In the end, even with all its flaws, I still enjoyed the book and learned more about History, Christianity and Art.
If you’re traveling to Rome, I recommend reading this book because it gives you a set of important places to visit and teaches you their History.
If you’re not into Art nor History, you should still read this book because it features debates that are still relevant today.
Rating: 4 stars
“Our minds sometimes see what our hearts wish were true.”
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