I took this book on a trip from Canada all the way down to Florida. I tried to read it a few times during the trip. Took it to the beach. Wasn't interested. The first few chapters are just not that very good. Upon returning to Canada, I picked it up again. Slowly but surely, the book gets better. More intriguing. It's not a book for the intellectual person. It's a book for the average Joe who loves a good story and knows something is rotten and somebody is getting away with murder. The shifting back and forth of the parallel narratives gets tiring somewhat. I enjoyed very much the last few chapters. I found them amazing. They are a beautifully written crescendo. The story about the shaman is just pure poetry. I read it 3 times. For a few minutes, I almost became a believer of what Mr. Darwin claims to be the truth of our origins as a species. ( )

The Darwin Conspiracy is a bloated, overwritten novel that was at times painful to read. The novel constantly flashes back from modern times, following Hugh and Beth, two grad students who follow the works of Darwin and come across the conspiracy described in the title, and to Darwin in his voyage on the Beagle, and then to the diary entries of one of Darwin’s daughters. I wasn’t a big fan of the constant flipping back and forth from modern time to the past and the constant shifts in points of view that accompanied it, but that was the least of this novel’s problems.

There were many things I didn’t like about this novel, but chief among them was that it was overly long for the story it was trying to tell. There was so much fluff in this novel that it could easily have been cut in half and not missed a beat. It seems to me as if the publisher wanted a certain word count, and the author didn’t have a long enough story to tell so he filled it with needless back story, side plots that were inconsequential, and as much fluff as he could muster. Beyond that, the characters were not terribly interesting. Finally, the novel tried to hype this massive, awe inspiring conspiracy for hundreds of pages, and when it finally did the reveal at the end, it had the amazing accomplishment of both being underwhelming and completely unbelievable. This is not a novel that is worth your time and money.

Carl Alves – author of Two For Eternity ( )

The only reason that this didn't get one star is that it is a gripping read. As historical fiction, it's terrible, downright libelous if Charles Darwin wasn't dead. I thought of creating a tag for "Ahistorical fiction", but I settled for "Alternate history." since this could only be true in another universe. I was mad at myself after I read it; I should have realized that it would be made up mostly out of whole cloth. I know, I know, freedom of speech, but unwary readers ought to be warned that this "conspiracy" is completely false. I won't say too much more for fear of creating spoilers, but it isn't the conspiracy suggested by Arnold Brackman and John Langdon Brooks in the 1980s that Darwin and friends conspired to cheat Alfred Russel Wallace of his proper credit for the theory of Natural Selection.

It's fine to for an author to "fill-in" the gaps in stories with plausible fictions. Elizabeth Darwin could well have kept a diary, for example. In this book, everything that is important is made up, and much of it is counterfactual, not just imaginative. "Significant liberties" as Darnton calls it. As an example, it is crucial to Darnton's version of Darwin's life that a certain character die in the 1830s during the voyage of the Beagle; in fact he died in 1890. He admits somewhat vaguely to making a change. I would be willing to bet that the two letters from missionary Richard Matthews are invented as well, although Darnton doesn't mention that. Contrary to what he said in the book, the article that I googled about Matthews said that he remained a missionary in New Zealand for the rest of his life. This bow to political correctness might be tolerable, if it weren't for the worse, and entirely false, fabrications.

I will never read another Darnton book; he's too untrustworthy. ( )

In The Darwin Conspiracy, Darnton has exploited holes and inconsistencies in Darwin’s life story/mythos to craft a historical pastiche that more or less delivers the goods.

By and large, I enjoyed the non-fiction elements of the book: Darnton’s account of Darwin’s early life, how he came to sail aboard the Beagle, and how he spent the later years of his life. However, I now feel like I need to read an authorized Darwin biography so I can sort out which of Darnton’s bits were authentic and which “embellished.”

Alas, the fictional elements of the book are decidedly less intriguing. I found his main character, Hugh, to be unsympathetic (a little whiny, to be frank) and his relationship with Beth, who may or may not be a descendent of Darwin, implausible. The subplot devoted to Hugh and the mystery behind his brother’s death distracts, rather than adds, to the tale, and another subplot involving a colleague of Darwin’s resolves with a disappointing thud rather than a narrative pop.

If you’re paying attention you’ll spot the “surprise ending” coming from a mile away, but that doesn’t necessarily detract from what may be the only part of the fictional tale that I enjoyed. While highly improbable, the denoument did make me crack a wry smile and spend some moments reflecting on the hypocracies that inevitably arise every time we insist on mythologizing our fellow men. I can’t help but think that George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Albert Einstein would empathize with our Heroic Scientist’s hypothetic predicament.

If you’re a fan of scientific fiction or Darwin, you may find this worthwhile. But if you’re looking for a riveting mystery – or, even better, a Da Vinci Code-like expose that reveals Darwin as a fraud or imposter – there are probably better ways to spend your time. ( )

This novel uses an effective mix of fiction and true facts of Darwin's life to tell an engaging story. Because the story is told from multiple viewpoints (Darwin, his daughter and a biology student, among others), the use of 3 narrators makes the audio much easier to follow and understand. This book would appeal to fans of historical fiction or those with an interest in evolutionary biology. Highly recommended. ( )