Eher 4,5 Sterne. Tolle Story und super Schreibstil, allerdings gab es doch einige Stellen, die sich sehr gezogen haben. Man hätte das Buch locker um 100 Seiten kürzen können, ohne wichtige Teile der Story auszulassen :)

"شعر لانغدون بالصدمة تصيبه كأى شخص أخر موجود فى الغرفة (بالنسبة لمن يقرا الرواية فالصدمة لكل من يقرا الرواية )
" كان ذهن لانغدون مشوشا ... ويناضل محاولا ايجاد مركزا للجاذبية يشده من جديد الى الارض ويعيد اليه رشده "
وهذا بالظبط ماسوف تشعر به عند الانتهاء من الرواية وخاصة اخر 100صفحة تقريبا من الرواية
لاأنكر انى فى بداية الرواية قلت لنفسى " جماعة سرية اخرى وستكون الرواية شبيهة لشيغرة دافينشى " لكن بالطبع دان براون سيقلب تفكيرك وبعد ان شعرت بالملل قليلا فى البد��ية وعدم الحماس ادخلنى دان فى دوامته واعتقد ان مع دان براون لاتحاول ان تتوقع الاحداث لاتتصور انك ذكى وتتوقع ماسيحدث لسبب بسيط ان دان سيقلب كل شىء انه بالفعل داخل رأسك ويقرأ أفكارك وسيوهمك انك قد توصلت بالفعل للحقيقة لكنه لن يلبث ان يصدمك لكن كان هناك شىء وحيد على ماأعتقد هو ماتوقعته منطقيا ان يحدث وقد حدث بالفعل حتى ان لم تحدث النهاية كما ظننت
رواية مشوقة وممتعة وقلم مميز لدان براون

n  4 Stars!n

So the moral of the story is n  be a good listenern!

n  “But who is more ignorant? The man who cannot define lightning, or the man who does not respect its awesome power?”n

Dan Brown did a brilliant job of creating an incredible story and building it up till 500ish pages and then in next two pages he completely destroyed it!
I loved the about three-fourth of the book but the ending did not appease me. But still I think it's worth reading at least once. The one thing that amazed me the most was that how one person can write from two utterly opposite point of views, Science and Religion. You had to take a second or two to stare at the page and appreciate the witty dialogues.

Overall, I think I liked the book.
I don't know if I'll ever reread the book again but there are some pages that I'd surely like to revisit.

n  “Science can heal, or science can kill. It depends on the soul of the man using the science.”n

بالاخره تموم شد!
نمیدونم از اونجایی که راز داوینچی رو خیلی وقت پیش خوندم ولی اونو بیشتر دوست داشتم. این هیجانش یکم اولاش بود با آخراش وسطاش یکم آهسته‌تر و طولانی‌تر بنظرم اومد….
به هر حال اکشن دوست.
همشم رابرت لنگدان رو تام هنکس تصور میکردم:>
تعقیب و گریز داوینچی بیشتر هیجان داشت بنظرم… به هر حال.

n  n

يخربيتك على جمال الرواية
يخربيتك على المعلومات الي فيها
يخربيتك على النهاية دي
يخربيتك على الطريقة الي عرضت فيها قكرتك

***
رائعة من روائع دان براون ، عادي يعني الرواية تكون جميلة كده ♥
بتناقش موضوع الدين والعلم ، وبالأدق الكنيسة والعلم ، الموضوع اختلف دلوقتي ؟ صح!
الكنيسة الي بتكره العلم لانه بيبعد الناس عن الكنيسة مش عن الدين نفسه ، والعلم الي بيكره الكنيسة لمحاربتها للعلم والعلماء على مر العصور ، رغم ان العلم كل يوم بيثبت وجود إله .

الطبقة المستنيرة

n  n
اقلب الصورة وشوفها تاني كده*

الي ظهرت ف القرن الخامس والسادس عشر الميلادي ، الي كل العلماء ف العصر ده كانوا بينتموا ليها على مستوى العالم هروبا من ظلم الكنيسة للعلماء وتعذيبها ليهم زي اوضح واحد جاليليو ، كان هدفهم استمرار ابحاثهم وعلمهم من غير علم الكنيسة في روما ، ومن غير علم اي مخلوق على الارض ، الوضع الي ادى لاقتصار العلوم على افراد الطبقة المستنيىرة .
وفجأة يظهر الكاهن كارلا فانتيسا ويستغل اسطورة الطبقة دي عشان يرجع الناس للكنيسة مستخدما استراتيجية الخوف والامل لجذب الناس ...
ولكن يصبح الصائد هو المصيدة !!

***

لما بول ديراك قاس اللف المغزلي للالكترون وحط معادلة لف الجسيمات الاولى حول نفسها ، وجد ان الناتج هيبقى سالب (-) وموجب (+) ، والي بيثبت ان الالكترون الي (-) ليه جسم مضاد (+) . والي بيثبت ان كل جسيم ليه جسم مضاد ليه . بس كالعادة محدش اهتم لنظرية ديراك لحد م كارل اندرسون اثبت وجود البوزيتورن (مضاد الالكترون) فعلا والي بيحتوى على جسيم مضاد (بيحمل عكس اشارة الالكترون) ،، ومن هنا بدأت قصة المادة المضادة وقوتها الخارقة بس محدش يعرف عنها حاجه غير انها عكس المادة ولما بتتصادم مع المادة بتنتج قوة اكبر بكتير من الطاقة النووية .

الموضوع ده بيفكرني بحصة الدراسات ، المستر كان بيقول لما اترمت القنبلة النووية ف الحرب العالمية الثانية ، مكنش حد يعرف حاجه عن القوة النووية ، فلو حصلت حرب عالمية ثالثة ، الله اعلم بالاسلحةالي هتبقى موجودة اصلا !
وفعلا ، ف الحرب العالمية الثانية محدش كان يعرف ان العلماء اكتشفوا طريقة للانشطار النووي الي بيصنع القوة النووية ، وفجأة ومرة واحدة لقوا القنبلة النووية بتترمى في هيروشيما ونجازاكي .

As soon as I finished Angels & Demons, I started feeling guilty--and a bit two-faced. You see, I've been telling anyone who would listen (my poor husband, mainly), about Dan Brown's atrocious writing style. Nearly every page was riddled with exaggerated descriptions, cartoon-like characterizations, implausibilities (even for a thriller), and just plain clumsiness.

But I am forced to admit that I turned those pages pretty rapidly--maybe a hundred a day near the end. After all, I had to find out if Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon and CERN physicist Vittoria Vetra would find the stolen antimatter hidden deep within the Vatican walls by the defunct-but-seemingly-resurrected religion-hating, science-loving, Freemason-infiltrating Illuminati cult. Was I going to let Mr. Brown's frequent references to his characters "looking" mad, angry, confused, impressed, stupified, insulted, etc. keep me from learning more about an organization to which George H.W. Bush, Galileo, and Cecil Rhodes were supposedly linked? Not on your life. And this does much to explain why Mr. Brown has earned so much money from his novels that he can afford to bail out a hapless financial institution or two. He can tell a story.

Angels & Demons is stitched together with just enough historical and scientific facts to get me to buy its shaky premise and continue reading. (Of course, maybe--probably--I'm just gullible). I am not a theologian, a physicist, an art historian, nor a Harvard "symbologist"--but I kinda like learning about that stuff without having to do any heavy lifting by cracking open a Bible or a physics book. Mr. Brown's strange brew of all these disciplines, plus his masterful juggling of characters, plot threads, and time constraints managed to pique my interest. I admit that I was dying to know if Langdon's extensive knowledge of Italian baroque sculpture would save the day and prevent further bloodshed in Rome.

A & D is a good summer beach read (though it's a rainy Chicago spring). It will redeem itself if I follow through on my vow to become reacquainted with Galileo's travails and to learn more about Bernini, antimatter, and the Freemasons--all through the magic of Wikipedia.

Because the movie version of Angels & Demons is being released soon, I decided to read the book first. As is almost always the case, I'm sure the book is far better. The book has great suspense that keeps you interested on each and every page. Because this edition is the illustrated edition, I also enjoyed doing arm-chair travelling in Rome and Vatican City. The photographs are beautiful and are very helpful in picturing in your mind where the story unfolds.

All of the trilogy is in my possession but I'm not sure I can continue with Book 2 after sentences in this one like:

A crisp breeze rustled the lapels of his tweed jacket.

He had always had a fond love of architecture.

Glick gave his guest a riveted look.

This one is so terrible I can barely type it: "Have both he and his camerawoman..."

It's ruffled, not rustled - rustled implies a noise. A crisp breeze will rustle fallen leaves. No tweed lapels have ever made a noise, no matter how crisp the breeze. But nor would a crisp breeze ruffle tweed lapels, since tweed is heavy wool, not chiffon.

Everyone in the book seemed to be hard of hearing.

"His name was Galileo Galilei," Langdon said.
Kohler looked up. "Galileo?"
"...even under torture."
"Torture?"
"The Vatican denounced the brotherhood as Shaitan."
"Shaitan?"
"...wealthy Bavarian store craftsmen called the Freemasons."
Kohler looked startled. "The Masons?"
"He considered himself a theo-physicist."
"Theo-physicist?"
"An item was stolen from Vetra by his murderer."
"An item?"
"Look at his face," Kohler said.
"Look at his face?"
"The Illuminati have always been more deliberate."
"Deliberate?"
"CERN's resident guru of Hatha yoga."
Hatha yoga? Langdon mused.
"A particle accelerator."
Particle accelerator?
"We see an annihilation."
Langdon's ears pricked up. "Annihilation?" He didn't like the sound of it.
"The group claiming responsibility calls themselves the Illuminati."
"The Illuminati?"
"Rome."
"Rome?"
"You're bluffing."
"Bluffing?"
"One of the four elements of science."
"Four elements?"
"The booklet has a low permanence rating."
"Permanence rating?"
"It is believed that only one copy survived the 18th century."
"One?"
"Raphael's buried in the Pantheon."
"The Pantheon?"

At no point was this thriller captivating, but the last 100 or so pages ramped up the idiocy as two people somehow survived a helicopter explosion thousands of feet in the air, coming down gently in Vatican City, and a priest and nun fell deeply in love and desired a baby, but determined not to break their vows of celibacy, went for artificial insemination instead. At many points during the novel I prayed for it to end, and finally......

f i n a l l y

........ my prayers were answered.

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1182548.html

You are the Director of CERN, and one of your senior colleagues is killed in his room with a peculiar word branded on his chest. Do you:
1) inform the authorities
2) google the word branded on the dead man's chest and then phone the first Harvard professor whose name appears in the search results
3) have a nice cup of tea?

You are the head of the Swiss Guard, responsible for the security of the Vatican during the conclave which will elect the next Pope. You receive reliable information that an explosive of unimaginable power has been hidden somewhere in the Vatican and will detonate in a few hours. Incidentally, four senior cardinals have also disappeared. Do you:
1) evacuate everyone, including the cardinals and most of the population of Rome
2) lock the cardinals into the Sistine Chapel and hope that the explosive device will be found by the Harvard professor and the cute physicist who have just turned up
3) have a nice cup of tea?

What was the fate of Copernicus?
1) executed by the church for heresy
2) died in his bed after a lifetime as a priest and senior government official in a church-run statelet
3) he had a nice cup of tea

How likely is it that a Catholic priest would be allowed to adopt a daughter?
1) if they are both interested in physics and she looks good in shorts, I can't see why anyone would find it unusual
2) you must be joking
3) perhaps they could have a nice cup of tea together

Was Winston Churchill a Catholic? Are only cardinals eligible to be elected Pope by ballot?
1) Boring technicalities!
2) A poor excuse for research
3) I've put the kettle on

Who do you trust most for good information on the historical relationship between religion and science?
1) Dan Brown
2) Richard Dawkins
3) Stephen Jay Gould

Angels and Demons is a definitive page-turner. It's over 600 pages and you could barely tell. I finally get why Dan Brown is amongst all-time best selling authors. The story takes place over a 24-hour period which helps intensify urgency.

However good it is, it feels does formulaic and mostly predictable except for about the last 100 pages or so which is bonkers. There is also another nitpick, I don't know if anyone else felt it too and it's about how time was used throughout the novel. There are scenes you can pick apart that play out like a 20 minute scene but then you realize it's barely been 5 minutes in book.

I didn't know what to expect-- I loved the DaVinci Code for what it was-- a page turner of a thriller-- and yet this book is on the top of the "worst" reads list for GR...

I thought it was a good read-- definitely kept me turning the pages-- but I agree it's weak in some areas (definitely had to suspend my sense of disbelief on more than one occasion) and it isn't as strongly written as it could be. However, I don't expect a fun read to be the strongest written book ever-- I expect to enjoy the book and have fun guessing the ending-- and this book delivered... I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know the Robert Langdon before The DaVinci Code.

Like most I’d first became aware of Professor Robert Langdon because of the phenomenon that was The Da Vinci Code, but in his introductory story it’s easy to see why it caught everyone’s interest.

Brown has a formula and it really works!
Short snappy chapters with interesting hook of murder is instantly going to draw the reader in.
Whilst a famous historic city (mainly in Europe) alongside the architecture and symbolism of the location being just as important to the narrative to the story.

They are fun and engaging reads, especially the early books in the series!