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Book Summary and Reviews of The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

The Lost Symbol

by Dan Brown

  • Critics' Consensus (13):
  • Readers' Rating (9):
  • Published:
  • Sep 2009, 528 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

The Lost Symbol once again features Dan Brown’s unforgettable protagonist, Robert Langdon. Brown's longtime editor, Jason Kaufman, Vice President and Executive Editor at Doubleday said, "Nothing ever is as it first appears in a Dan Brown novel. This book’s narrative takes place in a twelve-hour period, and from the first page, Dan's readers will feel the thrill of discovery as they follow Robert Langdon through a masterful and unexpected new landscape. The Lost Symbol is full of surprises."

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"As Browniacs have long predicted, the chase involves the secrets of Freemasonry and is set in Washington, where some of those secrets are built into the architecture and are thus hidden in plain sight....The new book clicks even if at first it looks dangerously like a clone.... The Lost Symbol manages to take a twisting, turning route through many such aspects of the occult even as it heads for a final secret that is surprising for a strange reason: It’s unsurprising. It also amounts to an affirmation of faith. In the end it is Mr. Brown’s sweet optimism, even more than Langdon's sleuthing and explicating, that may amaze his readers most." - The New York Times, Janet Maslin

"All of this is going to feel very familiar to readers of the previous Langdon books, even though Brown has shifted from foreign places to plant his thriller firmly on American soil.... Brown's narrative moves rapidly, except for those clunky moments when people sound like encyclopedias.... And yet, it's hard to imagine anyone, after reading The Lost Symbol, debating about Freemasonry in Washington, D.C., the way people did Brown's radical vision of Jesus and Mary Magdalene in Code. That book hit a deep cultural nerve for obvious reasons; The Lost Symbol is more like the experience on any roller coaster -- thrilling, entertaining and then it's over." - Los Angeles Times, Nick Owchar

"The plot of The Lost Symbol churns forward with a brutalist energy that makes character but a flesh appendage on its iron machine. It's fun, but you feel a little bruised afterward.... He's set himself a huge challenge. What he did for Christianity in Angels & Demons and The Da Vinci Code, Brown is now trying to do for America: reclaim its richness, its darkness, its weirdness. It's probably a quixotic effort, but it is nevertheless touchingly valiant. We're not just overweight tourists in T-shirts and fanny packs, he says. Our history is as sick and weird as anybody's! There's signal in the noise, order in the chaos! It just takes a degree from a nonexistent Harvard department to see it." - Time

"The downside of this not being quite the literary train wreck expected is that there is less distraction from the familiar hokum which, precisely because it is so familiar, looks ever-less like ingenious puzzle-spinning and ever-more like a wearisome party trick. Like divorce and civil war, The Da Vinci Code famously divided families. The Lost Symbol might well reunite them. They could all find it simply bland." - The Daily Telegraph (UK)

"Even after the book’s climactic showdown, you must slog through another 50-plus pages of exposition that Brown couldn’t cram into the main narrative. Sometimes it seems that authors, like their villains, don’t know when to leave well enough alone. C+" - Entertainment Weekly



This information about The Lost Symbol was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Reader Reviews

Write your own reviewwrite your own review

Lily

The lost symbol-Dan brown
It is such a good book. It contains good facts and interesting details about this world that not a lot of us know. I really recommend reading it. I also love the way Dan Brown writes and he shows and not tell what’s happening.

SHUBHAM

A VERY INTERSTING BOOK
It is a book from which I have gained some knowledge, and I also want that every person should read the novels of Dan BROWN . Thank you for featuring this novel.

lisleyreyes

The Lost Symbol
The Lost Symbol is indeed a very interesting story... the flow of the story is unpredictable... you will surely solve the case by yourself... :) Try this one..

Tanmoy Sarkar

The Lost Symbol
It’s yet another mystery rockers from Dan Brown called “The Lost Symbol” that will make you experience the thrill of Robert Langdon mystery adventure. Full of action, application of wisdom and knowledge, fast paced story telling, all the essentials of a successful murder mystery are here in this collection.

A reader from Europe

"The Lost Symbol" review
This is another book that follows the "Dan Brown" formula. If you like the formula (the "robert gets himself into a 24h adventure " formula) then you will like the book.

Plot wise, it was phenomenal. At first I was very skeptical about the plot, because some things didn't make logical sense to emit was like Dan ran out of ideas. But at the end when the plot twist is being revealed, I was shocked. It was intense. Everything made perfect sense about the characters and their motives.So,plot wise and story telling wise ,it was another great work by Dan

The thing I don't like about the book, was the fact it seemed "preachy". Every book of Dan has religious messages but this one was extreme. To the point I skipped those pages.

Overall, it was an absolute thrilling reading experience. I believe I finished the book in about a week or so.

Final verdict (by me ): 4/5

Jeffrey H

The Lost Symbol- Summary and Review
The Lost Symbol, written by author Dan Brown is quite possibly one of the most pulse-heightening, action-filled, nose-in-book thrillers that I have ever read. Being a fan of Brown, I would have to this is his best work yet, with more to come, I'm sure. This particular book focuses on the secrets and mysteries behind Freemasonry.

There was a concept concealed in the reading that I thought was very interesting. Langdon is told by Solomon that the “secrets of life are hidden in plain sight”, noting that man is a part of God; that through the thoughts of many minds, becomes one, being God. This is a principle that anyone who has faith in a deity would find interesting. The concept that we create God with our thoughts and are actions is quite interesting, and for those devoted to a religious background, it is a principle that should shake their world.
   
Overall, I felt that The Lost Symbol was a great success. I would highly recommend it to anyone who has the ability and desire to grasp theories of the meaning of life and the afterlife. Very impressive, Dan Brown. B.

...3 more reader reviews

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Author Information

Dan Brown Author Biography

Dan Brown is the author of many bestselling novels, including the #1 New York Times bestseller, The Da Vinci Code. He is a graduate of Amherst College and Phillips Exeter Academy, where he spent time as an English teacher before turning his efforts fully to writing.

In 1996, Dan’s interest in code-breaking and covert government agencies led him to write his first novel, Digital Fortress, which quickly became a #1 national bestselling eBook. Set within the clandestine National Security Agency, the novel explores the fine line between civilian privacy and national security. Brown’s follow-up techno-thriller, Deception Point, centered on similar issues of morality in politics, national security, and classified technology.

The son of a Presidential Award winning math ...

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