Deception Point by Dan Brown

I read 'The Da Vinci Code' & 'Angels & Demons'. I quite enjoyed them. 'Deception Point', published in 2001 is another story (no pun intended). I could only stomach 30 pages before i threw in the towel. What a load of unmitigated, illogical, wooden, cliched rubbish. But i'll waste another 20 minutes out of my life to tell you why.
In the first few pages some bloke out in the frozen wastes of (Antarctica?) is descended on by two fellows who land in a helicopter, hold him up at gunpoint, force him to send a message via radio, bundle him & his equipment (sleigh & dogs) onto the helicopter. The helicopter climbs to 4,000 feet & then they toss him , his dogs & the sleigh out of the rear of the copter. Why/ I have no idea. Nor do i care (see above). No doubt the reader discovers why this happens later in the book. I wish i cared why, but i don't. Why throw him out? If they wanted the 'powers that be' to think he had had an accident, why not just kill him & leave him for the dogs to consume when they got hungry? Illogical!
Next we are introduced to two fellows hunkering down, presumably in the same frozen waste. They are introduced as Delta One & Delta Two. Really? I mean, the reader is an invisible observer. Why call them Deltas One & Two? Why not Cyril & Bruce? One can only wonder how their conversations went:

Delta Two: "So, Delta One, your youngest boy, Delta One Jnr starts school soon doesn't he?"
Delta One: "Yeah, Delta Two. End of next week. He wants to be a cold hearted killer, just like his old man."
Delta Two: Really Dude? You must be so proud."
Delta One: "I am Delta Two. He's a real chip off the old block."

Ye Gods. Cliche.

And then we are introduced to the Senator's daughter & the Senator-who-would-be-President. The daughter is of course intelligent, ballsy, gorgeous (but negligently so), has a great job & is naturally, rich. Whilst her pater is insincere, unfaithful to her Mother (whose dead- pathos), superficial, vain & oh yes… a prick. Cliche.
But let's skip ahead to my personal fave bit. Said tasty Senator's daughter turns up to the front desk at her workplace & is required by the Marine at the desk to undergo a security procedure, even though he recognizes her. What's the test, i hear you ask? Well she has to place a piece of gauze in her mouth which the Marine then extracts with his own fingers. Ew! Hope he washes his hands after every test. And you don't know whats been in her mouth. Er… she might have a cold. Not to mention the device this saliva soaked gauze is placed in for testing. How is that cleaned or does the accumulated slobber just congregate & slosh around like a primordial swamp? Ew.
That's about it. If you're reading this, you may be wondering how i can decide i didn't like this book after only reading 30 pages. In fact i knew after 10 pages it was crap. I read the remaining 20 pages because i'm a Masochist. Also, when one hits a finger with a hammer, it's not necessary to repeat the process to know you don't like it. Hitting my finger with a hammer would have been preferable actually.


The Plot

Yawn… who cares?


I'm consigning my copy of 'Deception Point" to my recycle bin, in the hope it will be turned into something more useful. Perhaps egg crates. This is quite possibly the worst book i never read.

Good reading.

Fast paced thriller, which is enjoyable, albeit lots of technical jargon, and in typical Dan Brown fashion, decidedly far fetched!

Ok I have read 4 of the 5 Dan Brown books and I have come up with a user friendly recipe that anyone can use to create their own pulp fiction Dan Brown creation.
Add 1 strong, intelligent, attractive career woman.
Add 1 semi-strong, (but not as strong as the woman) man, that is semi-sucessful in his chosen career path (but not as successful as the woman) attractive, sensitive and totally not threatened by the strong intelligent woman.
Mix these two well but don't over mix because they will spend most of the book kinda liking each other, but not in a way that de-tracts from the main storyline even though its obvious that at the end they will end up in each other arms/beds, but not in a shades of grey kind of way.
Add 2 strong older, successful authoritative men, that are firm but fair and take the strong intelligent woman seriously, mentor here but are protective because they:
a. secretly love her or b. see her as a daughter replacement.
Add a sprinkling of other characters that move the storyline along, add some comic value but you don't really have to invest much time or thought into.
Add a large helping of historical/scientific facts that are inaccurate (or that sound pretty accurate to the non-educated reader) or have stolen from an already written, less reader friendly, non-fiction book that not many people know about or have read.
Add a splash of professional killer/killers hunting down the main characters, but are obviously not professional enough to kill them off.
Mix all ingredients together and select a couple of back drops that are slightly exotic and may help the tourism industry in this particular location.
Cook ingredients for 400-600 pages with short chapters that move back and forth between scenes, ensuring the low attention span reader does not get too bored.
Finally serve with a 'twist' that the evil person hunting them down/causing the drama is one of the old trusted guys that the strong woman trusted and is totally shocked and devastated but leaves no lasting or significant psychological impacts or male trust issues.
Voila; you now have a big chunk of Dan Brown magic!

هذه الرواية بجانب رواية الحصن الرقمي هما الوحيدتان اللتان كتبهما دان براون خارج سلسلة
روبرت لانجدون، عالم الرموز الشهير، فقررت أن أبدأ بهما قبل الدخول لعالم لانجدون المثير
~~~
في الحقيقة كنت أود الكتابة عن أحداث الرواية وأبطالها والمعلومات التي فيها ... ولكن وجدت
مراجعة عظيمة وشاملة للصديق محمد العربي
وسأكتفي بالإحالة عليها، تجدوها على هذا الرابط
~~~
الرواية كانت ممتعة بلا أدنى شك، ومشوقة في بعض صفحاتها، لكن كان هناك أمر وحيد أنقص
من استمتاعي بها، كم التشابه بين حبكتها وحبكة الحصن الرقمي، والتي قرأتها من مدة ليست بالبعيدة
~~~
في الختام ، وكما أقول دوماً، هذه النوعية من الروايات تُقرأ من أجل التسلية وتزجية الوقت، أما من
يريد أفكاراً عظيمة وقيماً سامية واقتباساتٍ رنانة، فلن يجد مراده وسيخيب أمله إذا ما قرأها.

The formula is pretty simple:
Big Mystery + Male Protagonist + Female Protagonist + Code to Solve + OMG TRAITOR WITH TWISTED MOTIVES = Best Selling Novel.

And it's worked, so I guess we can't hate on him too much. There are people who swear his books are the best thing they've ever read -- I certainly wouldn't say that. But they are successful and I have to confess, even I like them, and when it comes to books I am Picky with a most definite capital P.

Digital Fortress is the first one I've reread -- I read it yesterday. Coming straight from that into Deception Point, I've noticed very quickly that Dan Brown recycles description/emotional response.

"Although she had practically lived in Crypto since its completion three years ago, the sight of it still amazed her. The main room..." - Digital Fortress
"As Rachel made her way into the maze of bustling corridors beyond, she was amazed that even after six years she was still daunted by the collosal scope of this operation. The agency..." - Deception Point
"Susan waited for the punchline, but it never came." - Digital Fortress
"Rachel waited for the punchline. It never came." - Deception Point

All his characters might as well be the same people -- David Becker (Digitial Fortress) might as well be Robert Langdon (Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code) -- ordinary people caught up in higher things, in over his head and things somehow work out fine. Susan Fletcher (Digital Fortress) is, like Rachel Sexton (Deception Point) a professional woman, pretty, the best in her field, similarly in over her head and somehow coming out okay.

Also, the infodumps get terribly annoying. A brief bit of dialogue and then an absolute shedload of explanation. Another characteristic of Dan Brown's novels -- all very formulaic, as I said.

But hey, it's a formula that works.

5 stars
A thrilling and gripping page turner with a lot of action and almost non stop tension, building up towards the end. I really liked the characters and was so afraid Corky would die on me lol with the exception of Gabrielle. I found her to be quite gullible and annoying and although she redeemed herself at the end, it wasn't enough for me to like her. Although it did cross my mind who the controller might be, I dismissed the idea not wanting it to be him, which proves to me Brown did a good job in character building and getting me to connect with them. I'm a slow reader but managed to read this book (close to 600 pages) in nearly a single day, I just couldn't put it down!

نسبتا روان و جالب بود ولی یک جاهایی اش زیادی خیالی بود.مثلا این که رئیس جمهور آمریکا انگار کاری جز رسیدگی به ناسا و سرنوشت سه تا غیرنظامی نداشت!!و هی اتفاقی جان به دربردن های شخصیت های اصلی داستان منطق روایی نداشتند ولی خب در این سبک کتاب ها عنصر اتفاق نقش پررنگی دارد.
آخرهای داستان یک غافلگیری خیلی جالب داشت هرچند آن هم خیلی منطقی نبود ولی واقعا آدم را حیرت زده می کرد.
پرداخت خوبی داشت ولی شخصیت پردازی ها ضعیف بودند.
به عنوان سرگرمی کتاب خوبی بود و ترجمه ی روانی هم داشت.

Daha önce okuduğum kitaplardan aldığım Brown tadını alamadım.

3.5

As someone who tried and failed (miserably I might add) to read Brown's other books, I was a bit skeptical about reading this one. First, it was 736 pages long and I really hate to start big reads and give up on them. I feel like I would disappoint myself. Second, it had a mix of reviews and quite a few of them gave it one star and flagged it as boring and cliche as hell (some even said Brown's characters are all the same which makes it quite boring). And third, Brown's stories never really appealed to me so this was one of those random finds that I was debating on whether to chuck it in trash or give it a go.

I gave it a go and found it quite interesting. From all the technologies and small facts (not sure if they are 100% true but they seem plausible) about our government and NASA, it kept up my attention. The characters were a bit on the stale side but I forced myself not to mind it too much ( a lot of the times dull characters are one of the biggest reasons I give up on books). I felt a bit disappointed by the big finish at the end concerning the _______ since I thought it will be a historic find but whatever. The whole political side was at times boring but I was hoping Brown will end it just as I hoped he will and for the most part, he did.

Nothing much more for me to say except that these 700+ pages went by pretty fast as a lot of the chapters were few pages long. I probably won't read anything else by Brown for now but I will give Dan Simmons a try. GR friends, if you got any suggestions on which of his books to give it a go, let me know in the comments section. Grass-ias.

أول ما يلفت النظر في هذه الرواية هو أسلوبها السينمائي، ليس فقط في بناء الرواية وطريقة القص، بل في بناء الشخصيات نفسها..
أغلب كتابات دان براون تشعرك أنها كتبت خصيصاً بهدف تحويلها إلى أفلام، وقد تعاظم هذه الإحساس لدي مع روايتي "الحصن الرقمي" و"حقيقة الخديعة" بشكل خاص، الأولى من خلال المشاهد الختامية فيها والثانية من خلال شخصية "الممثل المساعد" كما أحب أن أسميه، وهو مساعد البطل خفيف الظل، الذي يبرع في استدرار الضحك من خلال تصرفاته الخرقاء وتعبيراته التلقائية وهو بالطبع أكثر شخصية تتعرض للضرب!
يمكنني أن أذكر عدداً لا حصر له من الشخصيات في السينما الأمريكية بهذا الشكل، فمساعد البطل من خلال شخصيته الخرقاء يبرز كمال البطل على نحو أفضل، حتى صارت تلك الطريقة من علامات السينما الأمريكية التي لا يمكن أن ترى فيلماً فيها إلا احتوى ذلك النمط من الناس.
لا أعرف إن كان ذلك الأسلوب قد تسرب إلى كتابات دان براون بشكل طبيعي أم أنه تعمد تلك الطريقة لإقناع المنتجين بتحويل المزيد من رواياته إلى أفلام.
"شفرة دافنشي"، "ملائكة وشياطين" وأخيرا "الرمز المفقود" لم تحتوي على نفس هذا التوجه السينمائي، ربما لأن طبيعة الرواية ونوعية شخصية البطل (روبرت لانغدون) الذي صار معروفاً لدى الجمهور، تجعل هذه الروايات لا تحتاج إلى بناء شخصياتها بهذا الشكل السينمائي الصريح، لا سيما أننا بعد 3 روايات صرنا نفهم شخصية "روبرت لانغدون" جيداً، وتكشفت لنا تركيبته وأعماقه، فلا داعي لإفساد الرواية بوضعها في قالب التصوير السينمائي المميز للسينما الأمريكية، والتي أعتبرها، في رأيي الخاص، شديدة الضحالة فيما يتعلق بإظهار عمق الشخصيات وتركيباتها النفسية.

فيما عدا ذلك لابد لي من الاعتراف أن "دان براون" هو موهبة حقيقية.. فعندما قرأت "شفرة دافنشي" لأول مرة، انبهرت بطريقة السرد وغزارة المعلومات، لكنني ظننتها مجرد "ضربة حظ" بالنظر إلى نوعية الموضوع الشائك الذي تناولته الرواية.
لكنني بعدما قرأت باقي أعماله، ورغم اعتراضي على الأسلوب السينمائي الضعيف والساذج الذي يعمد إلى استخدامه في بعض الأحيان، إلا أنني لازلت مبهورة بقدرة دان بروان على السرد المشوق (أسلوب شهرزاد كما أحب أن أسميه، حيث يتوقف في نهاية كل فصل عند نقطة شديدة الإثارة والتشويق)، وكذلك بغزارة المعلومات في مجالات متعددة ومتباعدة من الأديان إلى الرموز إلى العلوم الطبيعية إلى علوم الكمبيوتر مما يجعلني أقدر الجهد الفائق الذي بذله الكاتب في البحث والدراسة قبل أن يبدأ الكتابة، هذا إضافة إلى قدرته الفائقة على مزج الواقع بالخيال حتى لا تعود قادراً على التمييز بين الإثنين، والأهم قدرته على مفاجأتي في نهاية الرواية بما لا يمكن أن اتوقعه في كل مرة، فرغم أنني اعتدت على أن أبعد الشخصيات عن الشبهات في روايات دان براون، هي غالبا العقل المدبر لكل المؤامرات التي تتمحور حولها الرواية، إلا أن النهايات تظل غير متوقعة إطلاقاً، وشخصية الشرير، باستثناء رواية واحدة فقط من رواياته، لم أفلح أبداً في استنتاجها من خلال الأحداث وحتى السطر الأخير من الرواية.
الحبكات المتقنة، والأسلوب المقنع الذي لا يدع مجالاً للثغرات، والمعرفة الموسوعية التي تجعلك مندمجاً في الرواية تماما.. كلها من أبرز خصائص أسلوب دان براون، والتي تقنعني بانتظار رواياته القادمة بفارغ الصبر وأنا اعرف يقينا أنني ساستمتع بها.

This is the second book I have read from Dan Brown. I read The Da Vinci Code first. And, whoever read The Da Vinci Code would think this book does not measure up to the other book's penmanship.

But, I liked this book. This book has the same breath-taking suspense that does not let readers put down the book until the mystery is solved.

5,2100 Amazon Reviews avg 4.5
616,000 Goodreads ratings-WOW avg 3.73
The deception has to do with an asteroid with fossils from another planet.

Dan Brown-Great author, an interesting story, but...

What I liked:
-Well written, of course.
-I never got bored, but there was a lot of science. Maybe too much as I feel it did slow the story down.
- I liked the scenes on the glacier.
-Interesting story with lots of explanations.
-Tons of detail. The author obviously did a lot of research, but maybe a little too much.
-There were some surprises, but I kind of felt like I knew where it was going.
-I liked a lot about the book.

What I didn't like:
-Three people were on top of a slice of a glacier as it broke off and fell into the ocean, and they went underwater, then were able to be on top when it bobbed back up. REALLY!
-Shooting a Hellfire missile in Washington DC from a black ops helicopter. NO WAY!

What I HATED:
-Okay, it is fiction, but it so misrepresents Delta Force. The Army's equivalent to Navy Seals, more or less. It is just not true that they would be killing U.S. citizens and a Canadian and his sled dogs blindly, just following orders and never questioning. And how did their mysterious "controller", a civilian, get authorization to use Delta Force? Being ex-military, I am sure this bothered me more than most readers.

But still, definitely recommend it.