Thursday, October 13, 2005
Review: The Da Vinci Code
I know why "The Da Vinci Code" by Dan Brown is such a popular book. It's got all the elements of great pop fiction. Even Harry Potter could learn from it.
First of all, Brown has a habit of giving us slices of information, purposely and obviously leaving crucial bits out. That leaves us interested in finding out the rest of the story, and it draws us in. For example, at the beginning of the book, our hero is presented with a photo of a murder victim. He looks at it and says, "Who did that to him?" The cop says, "He did that to himself." A look of horror passes on our hero's face. You, the reader, are practically crying out, "What? WHAT? What did he do to himself?"
Second, he also gives us the answers in little pieces along the way. It's not too long till we find out what the murder victim did to himself. The whole book is filled with codes and secrets and clues, and they are revealed in a steady stream, while keeping the bigger mysteries a secret. It's small, steady gratification, keeping us interested.
Third, the chapters are very short. Sometimes one page. They switch back and forth between characters, so we're almost constantly involved in what's going on with a lot of different people.
And the plot ain't too shabby either. There's mystery, police chases, religious symbolism, controversy, and puzzle after puzzle.
The thing is, I thought there were two very obvious ways that the book could have been improved.
First, like I said, the plot is a long series of codes and puzzles being slowly figured out, in anticipation of the big final puzzle (the location of the Holy Grail). But many of the puzzles are solved by the characters using information that is known only to them, not to the reader. I mean, who knows the name of the ancient ram-god worshipped by the Knights Templar? The whole fun of puzzles is trying to figure them out and knowing that if you think hard enough, you can figure them out. A satisfying mystery novel works such that once it's figured out, you can at least look back at what you read and say, "Yeah, I should have thought of that. It's all right there!" But Brown is content to let his characters be smarter than his readers, and the puzzles are therefore solved at the author's whim. Whenever the hero happens to remember a certain obscure fact, the puzzle is solved and we move on to the next one. This is particularly bad because this is how the final mystery--the location of the Grail--is solved. There is no way a reader could have figured it out beforehand, because the necessary information is not given to the reader until the paragraph before the mystery is solved.
Almost worse, though, there is one glaring instance where Brown deliberately deceives his readers. It's more than a red herring--he's practically lying to us. One of the big mysteries of the book is the true identity of the villian, a character known only as "The Teacher." Not too far along, it becomes obvious that it has to be someone we know from elsewhere in the narrative, leading a double life. And the well-placed clues start building up until they're pointing directly at one certain character. As I was reading, I said to myself, "The Teacher has to be So-and-So. It would all make sense." In contrast to the mystery of the Holy Grail, in this case Brown has given us the necessary information to figure it out on our own. That's a very good thing.
But then he takes it all away. Just when I was sure I knew who the Teacher was, there is a scene where the Teacher and the character I thought he was are together at the same time in the same place (in the limousine at St. James's Park, for those who have read it). They even seemingly interact with one another. At that point, I decide that I must have been wrong. But I was right. Brown deliberately deceived me by making the Teacher do something stupid for the sole reason of throwing me off. That's not suspense. That's dishonesty. And it totally ruined the moment when the Teacher's identity is in fact revealed. I said, "Well that's who I thought it was all along! But it can't be--they interacted back at the limo. This is stupid."
The flaws didn't totally ruin the book for me. It's still a great read, and I would recommend it. But Brown thinks he's so smart, he's outsmarted himself and gone a little too far on making his puzzles hard to figure out. Sometimes you've got to make your puzzles doable.
First of all, Brown has a habit of giving us slices of information, purposely and obviously leaving crucial bits out. That leaves us interested in finding out the rest of the story, and it draws us in. For example, at the beginning of the book, our hero is presented with a photo of a murder victim. He looks at it and says, "Who did that to him?" The cop says, "He did that to himself." A look of horror passes on our hero's face. You, the reader, are practically crying out, "What? WHAT? What did he do to himself?"
Second, he also gives us the answers in little pieces along the way. It's not too long till we find out what the murder victim did to himself. The whole book is filled with codes and secrets and clues, and they are revealed in a steady stream, while keeping the bigger mysteries a secret. It's small, steady gratification, keeping us interested.
Third, the chapters are very short. Sometimes one page. They switch back and forth between characters, so we're almost constantly involved in what's going on with a lot of different people.
And the plot ain't too shabby either. There's mystery, police chases, religious symbolism, controversy, and puzzle after puzzle.
The thing is, I thought there were two very obvious ways that the book could have been improved.
First, like I said, the plot is a long series of codes and puzzles being slowly figured out, in anticipation of the big final puzzle (the location of the Holy Grail). But many of the puzzles are solved by the characters using information that is known only to them, not to the reader. I mean, who knows the name of the ancient ram-god worshipped by the Knights Templar? The whole fun of puzzles is trying to figure them out and knowing that if you think hard enough, you can figure them out. A satisfying mystery novel works such that once it's figured out, you can at least look back at what you read and say, "Yeah, I should have thought of that. It's all right there!" But Brown is content to let his characters be smarter than his readers, and the puzzles are therefore solved at the author's whim. Whenever the hero happens to remember a certain obscure fact, the puzzle is solved and we move on to the next one. This is particularly bad because this is how the final mystery--the location of the Grail--is solved. There is no way a reader could have figured it out beforehand, because the necessary information is not given to the reader until the paragraph before the mystery is solved.
Almost worse, though, there is one glaring instance where Brown deliberately deceives his readers. It's more than a red herring--he's practically lying to us. One of the big mysteries of the book is the true identity of the villian, a character known only as "The Teacher." Not too far along, it becomes obvious that it has to be someone we know from elsewhere in the narrative, leading a double life. And the well-placed clues start building up until they're pointing directly at one certain character. As I was reading, I said to myself, "The Teacher has to be So-and-So. It would all make sense." In contrast to the mystery of the Holy Grail, in this case Brown has given us the necessary information to figure it out on our own. That's a very good thing.
But then he takes it all away. Just when I was sure I knew who the Teacher was, there is a scene where the Teacher and the character I thought he was are together at the same time in the same place (in the limousine at St. James's Park, for those who have read it). They even seemingly interact with one another. At that point, I decide that I must have been wrong. But I was right. Brown deliberately deceived me by making the Teacher do something stupid for the sole reason of throwing me off. That's not suspense. That's dishonesty. And it totally ruined the moment when the Teacher's identity is in fact revealed. I said, "Well that's who I thought it was all along! But it can't be--they interacted back at the limo. This is stupid."
The flaws didn't totally ruin the book for me. It's still a great read, and I would recommend it. But Brown thinks he's so smart, he's outsmarted himself and gone a little too far on making his puzzles hard to figure out. Sometimes you've got to make your puzzles doable.
Comments:
You ought to read Brown's Angels and Demons. In a lot of ways, it's a better book. It has one scene where the main character escapes death in an extremely improbable (probably impossible) manner, but other than that, I actually liked it better. The rumor mill says that the notorious anti-established-religion Brown is going to include something about Mormonism in his next book... heard anything about that?
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