Massive Nerd

There is very little I can say about this book without giving anything away, so this will be a short one.

The Lost Symbol is not a bad book.
The Lost Symbol is not a bad Dan Brown book.
The Lost Symbol is a bad Robert Langdon book.

Brown has a great tradition of taking 100% factual evidence and creating amazing fictional stories out of it. The Lost Symbol has everything you want from a Brown book: shadowy conspiracies, secret organizations, bizarre plot twists and stunning revelations.

However, we've come to expect more from Brown's Langdon novels. I, personally, love trying to solve the puzzles along with Langdon and reveling in his knowledge of obscure references. However, The Lost Symbol has very little of this. Langdon only solves about 2 or 3 riddles across the story, and even then, he has his hand held through it.

Honestly, you can't even call this a Langdon novel, since most of the story is told from the point of view of other characters. Sure, it's nice to see different points of view on the story, adding depth to the mystery. However, when half of your book doesn't involve the main character, that's a problem.

Lastly, it almost feels as if Brown is overly preachy as the book winds down after the climax. The constant repetition of the potential of the human race just gets annoying, especially after the disappointing story.

Again, it's not a BAD book, I was just expecting much more.