The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown
I read Dan Brown's thriller 'Angels and Demons' a while ago, and found it very, well, thrilling. I had been on the lookout for a copy of the sequel - The Da Vinci Code - since, so the moment I spotted it on the shelf in the library, I snaffled it.
I can conclude that this was also very thrilling. It moved at a considerable pace from literally the first page, and at times was so tense that my brain couldn't keep up with my eyes racing along the lines, and I found that I'd read a whole page in about three seconds flat without actually taking any of it in.
I've since been thinking: what it is about Dan Brown's writing that makes it a thriller? How has he actually, practically, managed to make it so fast-paced? Admittedly, I think a some it comes down to content rather than any particular literary technique, but I believe it's still a valid discussion.
Firstly, Brown has an incredible ability to make things go wrong. Without wishing to spoil anything, every time you think they've escaped, they haven't really. The enemy is always closer than you realise, and the whole book is one long sequence of very close shaves. It's nail-biting stuff.
But there is a literary technique that Brown employs that makes this particularly effective - and that is perspective. The more I think about literature, the more I realise perspective is one of the greatest tools in a writer's kit. Perspective can pave the way for a distinctive narrative voice; it can taint a plotline; it can open your eyes to an under-represented demographic or force you to see something in a new light. But Dan Brown has wielded the power of perspective in another way.
He has at least three different narrative threads going on simultaneously, and all happening in the narrative present. The main one follows Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu (a Harvard professor and a cryptologist), who are trying to solve a mysterious treasure hunt concerning a dangerous historical truth. The second follows the members of a religious cult, who are racing Langdon and Sophie on the same hunt. And the third follows the French Judicial Police, who are chasing Langdon and Sophie.
The perspectives are effortlessly flicked between so that we track the progress of the independent groups in real time. We watch them make their discoveries, we see them hatch plans against each other. It makes way for fantastic dramatic irony too - because we, the reader, are following all three groups, there are often moments when we know things that some of the characters don't. Of course, there are plenty of occasions where we are equally in the dark, but it's actually just as tense when you know the characters are walking straight into a trap...
The other thing that makes this story so compelling is how realistic it is. The dialogue is natural, and the characters are nuanced, but the setting is what really does it. Real places, real people, real objects. The mystery is so closely intertwined with historical fact that you get drawn in, almost forgetting that none of it is real. Although the whole thing is a work of fiction, I think the fact that it concerns real historical and Biblical figures makes the conspiracy all the more thrilling.
Interestingly, though, I think I preferred Angels and Demons. Its literal ticking time bomb made the race against time even more significant. I think the romance was done better in Angels and Demons. And although the Church is largely presented as the enemy in both books, the Da Vinci Code's more overt portrayal of the Church as desperate, lying, and ultimately delusional did irk me slightly.
Overall, though, it was an excellent read. Pacy, clever, sophisticated, with some shocking twists that I did not see coming. It was most certainly a thriller, and I was most certainly thrilled.