hmmmmm....came on the back of reading several other religious/conspiracy stories, so was a bit fed up by this point. There was also little tension in the book, and some of the dialogue in particular made this feel like a first novel in the "let's get a load of detail out in a paragraph spoken by someone to someone else who really should know all this crap, cos I cant work the description in any better" way.[return][return]On the whole the story is ok, but not really gripping..... ( )

Dopo aver letto Il codice Da Vinci e Il Pendolo di Focault, questo romanzo non mi dice proprio nulla.
La storia è decisamente assurda, con incontri/scontri che ricordano Levy.
La caccia al tesoro che parte dal passato per arrivare ai nostri giorni è piuttosto sconclusionata e in certi punti incomprensibile: forse avrei dovuto ritagliare le ultime 40 pagine, per comporre il puzzle sulle orme dei protagonisti - ma il libro era della biblio...
In queste ultime pagine-enigma sono riportate citazioni varie, che nel corso del romanzo vengono spiegate solo in parte.
Il finale rasenta il ridicolo, ma nel complesso la lettura è piacevole - e solo per questo ho dato 2 stelle. ( )

I had this book for years, I remember it was expensive, hardcover, deigned like a file, holding besides the book some documents written in Hebrew with puzzles. But I haven't read it yet, every time I open it to read it, I can't get past the first page. I think interesting books should catch your attention from the first paragraph. Basically, I bought it for the design, cover and title; I still love flipping through it. But until I actually read it, there is nothing else to say.

I had this book for years, I remember it was expensive, hardcover, deigned like a file, holding besides the book some documents written in Hebrew with puzzles. But I haven't read it yet, every time I open it to read it, I can't get past the first page. I think interesting books should catch your attention from the first paragraph. Basically, I bought it for the design, cover and title; I still love flipping through it. But until I actually read it, there is nothing else to say.

Will Stafford has inherited a key and some mysterious papers from his mother, and so while he travels Europe in his profession as photographer, he is also on the trail to find the answers to the riddles. Lucy King's story becomes intertwined with Will's in the most dramatic way, and she is instrumental in finding the long-lost legacy that was hidden by Will's ancestor centuries before.

It is clear that the author has invested an enormous amount of time and research into this novel, her debut, but I'm afraid to say that it hasn't paid off. A lot of the events described are just a little too far-fetched and bordering on the ridiculous for me to take any of the characters or the plot developments seriously, and I had to suspend disbelief a little too often. The plot is littered with rather convenient coincidences, inspirations and thought transferences, while there are contradictions elsewhere. The characters are, with one exception, one-dimensional, and I'm afraid to say that I couldn't really engage with any of them; the person I most related to is only present at the beginning of the book, and their departure affected me surprisingly deeply. There's a lot of mystical mumbo jumbo about, making the whole appear like a Da Vinci Code for women, based on British history and literature. The numerology in the novel is at first intriguing but doesn't bear up to scrutiny when examined at length (and we have to take the author's word for much of it as Dee's system isn't explained), at least in my opinion. Don't expect to see much of Shakespeare in the novel, as I did, he very rarely makes an appearance, direct or indirect (though the epilogue is just plain silly). About halfway through I lost interest and didn't really pay much attention to the riddles any more, and I struggled to make it to the end, only to feel that it wasn't really worth persevering, and that the whole had been contrived and pointless.

The author has taken the trouble to print the thirty-four riddles in the Appendix (points for inventiveness there), so if you're so inclined you can follow Lucy and Will's footsteps and try to solve them yourself; I'm afraid to say that I couldn't be bothered after having spent so much time on it already. ( )