First, a quick aside, I promise that reviews on this blog will NOT contain spoilers. I love picking up a book I know very little about and I love a good plot twist even more. So rest-assured I will not give away any of the juicy details that are best discovered by the reader.

The Lost Symbol follows the same template that proved so successful for Brown with Angels & Demons and The Da Vinci Code. Unlikely fictional hero, Professor Robert Langdon, has been summoned to a familiar, yet enigmatic location — this time Washington, D.C. — to impart his vast knowledge in the area of symbology. Langdon becomes embroiled in a fast-paced adventure, complete with suspenseful chase scenes, a non-romantic female companion, and cliff-hanger chapter endings. Despite the familiar formula, The Lost Symbol is no less a page-turner than Brown’s other bestsellers in the Robert Langdon series.

Langdon is once again the key to deciphering and connecting the dots between clues found in obscure artwork and artifacts, historical sites and mythology. But this time the backdrop to Langdon’s quest and the subject of the book’s conspiratorial overtones is the mysterious and ritualistic world of Freemasonry. To work through decoded riddles, Langdon must indulge the Masonic affinity with the “Ancient Mysteries,” i.e. ancient wisdom that can purportedly endow man with the power of gods, against his better judgment. At stake are the lives of those close to Langdon, widely accepted beliefs about religion and power, and the CIA’s ubiquitous “national security” concerns.

The Lost Symbol jumps right into the storyline and develops its characters bit by bit as it goes, which keeps the book moving forward. The suspense builds to a crescendo and for the most part delivers in the end. I was disappointed at one of the first big reveals, which was plausible, but a bit weak. Then, all was forgiven when a few pages later Brown hit me with a plot twist that I never saw coming.

Brown is a master at weaving together fact and fiction so that one can no longer distinguish the two. I found myself wishing I had a research library — not merely Google — at my disposal after each chapter. But since each chapter left me wanting more, I rarely had time to dwell on my research topics before moving onto the next chapter and more eyebrow-raising science and history. Brown states before even beginning Chapter 1: “FACT:  . . . All rituals, science, artwork and monuments in this novel are real.” And let me tell you, some of the science is out there!

Simply put, The Lost Symbol is a suspenseful page-turner that will especially appeal to science, conspiracy and history buffs. (Full disclosure: I am all three.) I have one word of caution, however, as certain portions of this book contain a level of violence and gruesome detail that I do not recall in Brown’s earlier works and may be difficult for some readers. But if you can get through those squirmy pages, you’re in for a thrilling read.

credit: www.sxc.hu//nkzs

But I do love a good book — historical novels, nonfiction, modern chick lit, graphic novels, Harry Potter, anything that can transport me into another world. When I was in school, I probably read about 25-30 books a year for fun, mostly over the summer and other school breaks. When I started working full-time (pre-law school) and my daily commute became my best opportunity to read, that dropped to about 20-25 books. Starting in law school, my work involved reading case after case all day, every day, and reading lost some appeal as a hobby. Another drop. With the move to Kentucky, I was no longer commuting by public transportation. Another Drop. So, my book count probably dropped to about 15-20 a year. Then came pregnancy. There was probably a spike in my reading rate during that time, but the only place those books transported me was to the labor room in my imagination and the anxieties of motherhood. In the 14 months since Lilly was born, reading for fun has been sadly neglected. To the best of my recollection this is all I’ve managed to get through (in reverse order):

1. The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (Annette Gordon-Reed) — in progress…for months!
2. What to Expect: The Toddler Years (H. Murkoff) — in progress
3. What to Expect: The First Year (A. Eisenberg, H. Murkoff & S. Hathaway)
4. Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child (Marc Weissbluth, M.D.)
5. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (J.K. Rowling)
6. The Enchantress of Florence (Salmon Rushdie) — abandoned 2/3 of the way in
7. Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe (Bill Bryson)
8. Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale (James B. South) — not the best in this philosophy series, but short chapters kept me going
9. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (J.K. Rowling) — I re-read this right after Lilly was born under the laughable assumption that I would also re-read Half-Blood Prince before the Deathly Hallows. Yeah right!
10. The Girlfriends’ Guide to Surviving the First Year of Motherhood (Vicki Iovine)

So, there it is. I’m down to less than 10 books a year, almost 50% of which are baby-related books. That is a depressing fact. I suppose the silver lining is that I’ve become a more practical reader. I used to be the kind of person who always had to read a book to the end, no matter how tedious a chore it became. Now, I have no time, and thus no patience, for meandering stories with no point and poor writing. I have no qualms about setting aside a book that is doing little more than wasting time that could be spent reading a good book. And I’m willing to put in the time to get through a compelling book — and it takes lots of time when you only read 5-6 pages at once. (The drawback to this new style of reading, however, is that I miss out on those books like Gone With the Wind that seem to move too slow for a while but then become a fantastic read in the last 100 pages.)

I’m thinking there must be a better way. How do moms do this!? It can’t be that we all must fall out of the literate world just because we have reproduced! Maybe there needs to be a new kind of book club for moms. One that meets every six months and expects that you’ve only read the first chapter. Or one that skips the analysis and conversation and consists solely of a brainstorming session where moms can piece together the storyline of the book based on the group’s faint memories of our brief moments of reading before falling asleep. Who am I kidding? We’d just descend into conversation about sleep schedules, toddler tantrums and teething anyway. And then I’d have to pick up the latest What to Expect book.