This book could best be summarized as the result of Nicholas Sparks (The Notebook) attempting to write a guide to college life at Princeton, while occasionally mentioning a mysterious ancient encoded document just enough to serve as the proverbial dangling carrot for the reader lured in by comparisons to Dan Brown.

The Rule of Four is first a book about four young men at college, and their trials and tribulations and interpersonal relationships. It is second a book about the fond remembrance of time spent at Princeton, and only third a book about an ancient encoded document, which seems a subplot at best.

First the good, then the bad. This is a well-written book, with rich almost tactile descriptions, intense character depth and development, intelligent references to historical events, fantastic similies and metaphors, and warm nostalgia for anyone who enjoyed college life. Unfortunately, this list excludes what most paperback readers look for first- an exciting plot. It appears that the list of compliments presented above seems to have taken the authors' attention away from crafting a thrilling plot. Only a handful of chapters can be called "page-turners"- the rest of the book plods along slowly and sometimes seemingly aimlessly, spending many chapters on tangents developing the characters to a level only a psychologist could appreciate, and describing locations, traditions and events at Princeton only an alumnus could appreciate. Clearly it takes a skillful writer to do these things so well as the authors, but when the effort takes away from an involving plot, it leaves the reader wanting more.

Perhaps if the jacket had not made comparisons to Dan Brown's DaVinci Code (which I found enthralling), my comments would be different. Then again, if the jacket had more accurately compared the story to Nicholas Sparks, I would not have read it.