The Lost Symbol

THE LOST SYMBOL
Dan Brown

I decided to read this book based on a recommendation from a friend. I have never read anything else by Dan Brown, so I really didn’t know what to expect. My friend told me he couldn’t put it down. I’ve had the opposite problem with a lot of books I’ve read…I easily could put them down because they weren’t all that good. I love to read, but the book has got to keep me interested.

I’ll go ahead and say that I’m giving this one five stars. Is this the best novel I have ever read? No. But it is one of the most suspenseful, riveting, difficult-to-put-down novel I have ever read. I was reading for two hours at a time, which is something I never do. I was reading with the TV blaring, my daughter playing loudly, my wife talking on the phone, all at the same time, and I was focused. This novel grabbed me and held my interest.. I love how the chapters are short, the action is fast, with lots of twists and turns and cliffhangers throughout the whole book.

It's not literature, it's entertainment. Nothing more. Judging it by that standard, it gets the five stars.

Dave

There Goes The TV Remote...

Snow & Ice + Wife = 8 Long Weeks

Last Saturday, my wife decides to take a few photos of the snow from the night before. What she ended up with was an education....

She learned that house shoes suck as snow shoes.

Bath robe is not near warm enough when you lay down on the cold driveway.

Both feet are needed to get from point A to Point B.

Going to the E.R. requires 6 1/2 hours of waiting.

She finally admits that a Lay-Z-Boy would have been a smart purchase.

And finally, the things she has learned that really suck for me...

She now knows I can cook, do dishes, clean clothes, pick up after myself and she has learned that I CAN remember to put the toilet seat down.

She will recover in about 8 weeks. I have a feeling this will haunt me for the rest of my life.

Mark

Killer Instinct

Killer Instinct
Joseph Finder

I finished reading this book over the weekend, and thought I'd post a review. The only other book I have read by Finder is Power Play, which was good and is why I decided to read another one by him.

I like the premise of the story, which is about a sales exec whose career is going nowhere until he meets an ex-Special Forces soldier. They become friends and the sales exec gets him a job at his company. After that, good things start to happen for the sales exec, while bad things start to happen to his enemies. He finally realizes that his new friend is behind everything good and bad that's been happening. He gets in trouble when their friendship starts to go bad.

I don't want to give anything away about the book, so I'll just say that I didn't think the writing was as good as it was with Power Play, and I think Finder forced his way through the book, much like I had to force myself to finish it. I'd only give this one a 2 on a scale of 1 to 5.

Dave