Finished "The Da Vinci Code" and I have to say, it's not as good as people seem to claim. The story is extremely contrived, the research is sketchy in parts (I found a couple of possible discrepancies in his research in half an hour of surfing the Internet) and are often a thinly-veiled attempt at "showing off" his so-called knowledge. Some of his "riddles" and "codes" are laughably amateurish and juvenile and can be cracked in a matter of seconds. I will say that the second half of the book is fairly racy and readable, and some of his revelations are interesting, specifically his main claim about Da Vinci's "The Last Supper." However, as a "master storyteller" Dan Brown cannot hold a candle to Frederick Forsyth.
"The Da Vinci Code" is not so much a mere book as it is a marketing phenomenon. Dan Brown has exploited both the reach of the Internet and his readers' curiosity to their fullest and supplemented the novel with photographic tours of various locations and artefacts used in his books, puzzles based on them, and an introduction to the amazing world of ambigrams, courtesy John Langdon. These peripheral attractions are far more interesting than the book itself.
For those who are interested, there are five codes that can be broken fairly easily scattered on the dust jacket of the book. You can play the game (and a couple of others) on the book's official website. For further reading on one of the codes, visit this site. The speech claims a historical connection between Prophet Joseph Smith's Mormon faith and the ancient Masonic cult. The subject of another code is described here in pretty interesting detail.
The original Quest is another series of puzzles that took a little more effort and was more fun.
