Some readers spurn genre fiction, often due to a misguided belief that mass entertainment is always mindless dribble. For those of you who know better, The Da Vinci Code will make you feel justifiably smug. It's that rare book that manages to both entertain and educate simultaneously. Dan Brown has managed to outdo the best of Robert Ludlum in this byzantine....and engrossing story. There is enough medieval history to please any historian and enough action to satisfy a hardcore thrill-seeker. Combined, it makes The Da Vinci Code an early favorite for thriller of the year.

A multi-layered, highly sophisticated tale.
Readers with advanced degrees in comparative religion, European history, symbology, art and cryptology, will have a grand old time with Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. The rest of us stumble through, grasping at this clue and that, gasping in surprise at one or another shadow around the next corner, and likewise have a grand old time. The novel is maddening, scary, complicated and almost impossible to put down once you're hooked.