jack

Hm. As a plot, Angels and Demons is fairly good. Particle accelerator scientists at CERN discover a new source of energy. Scientists with religious backgrounds read theological implications into apparently "free" energy. Illuminati-infatuated terrorists steal a test device and secrete it in the Vatican on the eve of a Papal election. Academic historian with expertise on the Illuminati is called in to predict the movements of the terrorists. A small romance subplot. Lots of science vs theology discussion.

In general, it's all stuff I really like. It portrays both science and religion sympathetically (although it does keep having Catholics as antagonists).

He avoids the mistake of Da Vinci Code in publicly claiming that all the conspiracy theory crap he made up or stole from somewhere was actually true.

However, I still find it difficult to read, because about three times a page, there's a Big Revelation where he spells out something many ten year olds would find obvious. Which is very unfair of me, because if you're NOT very academic, you may well NOT know all of this (I don't know any of the Vatican history stuff, for instance). But it does make it hard for me to read.

I don't have time to list ALL of the things I found annoying. But a random selection of the first few dozen:

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My "what C++ operator" test is still unwritten. So is "What prime number are you."

But I got messaged out of the blue by two okcupid girls while I was logged in. Is it just me or is that kind of backward?

And then I did some browsing of it's suggested matches. Reading just the favorite book line is interesting. Lots of people like LOTR. Fair enough. Several like Robert Jordan or Terry Goodkind. Fair enough, it spotted the right genre. One liked Larry Niven. Score! Two liked "anything by Dan Brown." What did I do to deserve this? OK, they're not *bad* and a if relationship can survive diametric religious and philosophical views... but still[1].

Update: Though there was at least one person listing Dostoyevski and Dan Brown. *shrug* Apparently my disclaimer was truer than I knew :)

[1] Actually now I come to think of it, I remember someone else compaining about the phenomenon. I think the reaosning is that a bestseller is always a fairly safe choice if you want to say you read, but don't have many details.