So, sometime last week I finished Foucault's Pendulum. I read it because my book club (against my suggestion) elected to read The da Vinci Code ... and I hated it. Umberto Eco's work came up in discussion as a more intellectual version of a similar story.
I'd read The Name of the Rose before and found it enjoyable, and a friend gave me a paperback version of FP. I began my slog through it.
'Slog' is perhaps too rough a word. I read the whole thing - it wasn't incomprehensible - but it also wasn't a pageturner. I was in Quebec for the first third of the book, that somehow made it more interesting - the linguistic portions of my brain were already limbered up. As we moved southwest I lost some interest in the book - it was covering ground very slowly. I've got a passing interest in the Templars and their friends, as well, one would think this would be right up my alley.
But all I can muster is a half-hearted endorsement of this book. If, like me, you loathed Dan Brown's sloppy dVC then this will at least restore your literary equalibrium. To restore my own balance, however, I'm now chewing through some pulpy Bruce Sterling scifi.
Bonus Question: What should I read next - The Three Muskateers or The Years of Rice and Salt?
Posted by msouthwo at July 12, 2004 08:44 PM