Codebreakers rack their brains to solve Dan Brown's new poser

London Times ^ | 1/2/06 | Ben Hoyle

[wagglebee]

The publisher says the clues are already out there — on the cover of The Da Vinci Code

THE ink is not yet dry on the eagerly awaited sequel to The Da Vinci Code, but already fans of the publishing phenomenon believe that they have deciphered clues to its plot.

The CIA, the Freemasons, the Mormons and an unfinished pyramid on the US dollar bill are all expected to figure prominently in Dan Brown’s next adventure when it is published this year or early next.

Fevered speculation has been building among the author’s legions of fans since it emerged that hints to The Solomon Key were incorporated into the design of The Da Vinci Code’s American dustjacket.

With worldwide sales of more than 40 million copies, including 4 million in Britain, The Da Vinci Code and its blend of conspiracy theories, shadowy secret societies and thrilling adventure has already spawned an industry of its own.

A film version of the novel, starring Tom Hanks as the Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon, and Audrey Tautou, who played the title role in Amélie in 2001, as the French cryptographer Sophie Neveu, opens in May.

Bookshops are overflowing with parodies and with works promising to examine the issues raised in The Da Vinci Code. A further spate of books is attempting to pre-empt the subject matter of the sequel. In Secrets of the Widow’s Son, for example, the journalist David Shugarts purports to offer an “explorer’s field guide to understanding the main themes, ideas, symbols and historical issues which author Dan Brown will most likely utilise in The Solomon Key”.

A veteran of The Da Vinci Code industry, he and his team of researchers believe that Mr Brown has chosen Washington as the location for his next novel after setting Robert Langdon’s previous adventures in Paris, London and Rome.

In The Guide to Dan Brown’s The Solomon Key, Greg Taylor suggests that the new book will refer to the Masonic and Utopian views prevalent among the founding fathers of the United States and to the Skull and Bones society, the secret Yale brotherhood to which both candidates in the 2004 US presidential election once belonged. He also highlights conspiracy theories linking the unfinished pyramid on the US dollar bill to the Masons.

Doubleday, Brown’s publisher, has posted a “webquest” on the internet as part of its advance marketing strategy for the new book. The webquest challenges budding codebreakers to unravel a series of puzzles starting with the ciphers and symbols that are “already in your possession”.

The site says: “Disguised on the jacket of The Da Vinci Code, numerous encrypted messages hint at the subject matter of Dan Brown’s next Robert Langdon novel.”

A faint grid reference written in reverse on the cover leads, with an adjustment of one degree, to a sculpture called Kryptos in the courtyard of the CIA’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Kryptos is covered in about 1,800 letters of code, much of which is still a mystery despite its location at the workplace of some of the world’s shrewdest cryptographers.

A further clue on the jacket is visible with a magnifying glass. Some of the lettering describing the plot is in bolder type than the rest. When read separately from the other words the letters read: “Is there no help for the widow’s son?” Those words, a Masonic call for help, have been linked to Joseph Smith, the founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, known as the Mormons.

He started to say them as he fell to his death from a window after he was shot and fatally wounded by the mob who stormed his prison cell in Carthage, Illinois, in 1844.

Brown is reluctant to betray too many details but he has said that he grew up surrounded by the “Masonic lodges of our fathers” and confirmed that his next novel would be set “within the oldest fraternity in history, the enigmatic brotherhood of the Masons”.

[rlmorel]

FHC stands for: "Fosseus Habitus Comenglus" which loosely translates to: "The Skull and Bones Society".

I think.

And Buuuuush is one of those, as is Kaaaarl Roooooove....:)

[frgoff]

Just a reminder .....Dan Brown ...writer of FICTION.

According to Dan Brown, his novels are essentially factual dramatizations of real historical events.

[rlmorel]

Course, I have to be careful about giving away the secrets over here...there could be a mass run off of a cliff over in DU if I do it correctly!

[Robwin]

"...kind of like the same people who thought that Oliver Stone's "JFK" was a documentary." What? It wasn't? What are you trying to say here?

[munin]

Me think you and Lizavetta should stick to "The lone Ranger" and the "Roadrunner" and leave Dan Brown's writing to us that like good mystery and conspiracy writing.
I got all of Dan Brown's books and will likely buy the next one to

[teenyelliott]

Oh, nice. I think his writing is very boiler plate, so you tell me to read the Roadrunner.

Perhaps I read more than you do, and recognize crap when I see it.

[maestro]

.....The publisher says the clues are already out there ? on the cover of The Da Vinci Code

Uh,......the 'Table' is really a 'bingo' table.....

[Range Rover]

Looks like Brown has just "Fictionalized" The Hiram Key by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas this go-round...how original

Next up will be Graham Hancock's Fingerprints of the Gods or maybe he'll re-write The Templar's Secret Island by Henry Lincoln.

This guy has quite a racket going. There is certainly plenty of source material to pull from. Can't wait until he works Oak Island, Rennes-le-Château, Bérenger Saunière, Visigothic treasure troves and maybe even the discovery of the Ark during Timkat in Ethiopia....Should be good for at least ten more volumes, I would think.

[Mordacious]

...and leave Dan Brown's writing to us that like good mystery and conspiracy writing.

You could easily make the case that Brown is a good to excellent storyteller, but he is an atrocious writer. The writing in The Da Vinci Code was so awful, I found myself alternately laughing and weeping as I moved from page to page. Dan Brown is many things, but he is NOT a good writer.

[rlmorel]

LOL!

You want to hear a funny one...my wife and I went to see "Apollo 13" when it came out a few years back...as we were leaving the theater, there was a young couple in front of us, and the young gal turned to the guy and said: "I'm really glad the movie ended like that..."

[Xenalyte]

Okay, I have my DVC right here . . . all it has on the cover is "The Da Vinci Code," "Dan Brown," "Author of Angels & Demons," part of the Mona Lisa's face, and some script that (if I know my Tolkien, and believe y'all me, I do know my Tolkien) looks to be Elvish.

[ruoflaw]

I realize it is fiction but I couldn't get through the book because I thought it was so lame. I wish I had liked his writing.

[Mordacious]

I think his writing is very boiler plate

Calling it boiler plate is kind. It's offal. I'm shuddering just thinking about it.

[teenyelliott]

I agree.

[BunnySlippers]

I just ordered it at the library. Was it good?

[PeoplesRepublicOfWashington]

Dan Brown isn't a bad author as long as you take his writing as the fiction it is.. the problem is too many people take his books seriously.

Dan Brown is a great author, as evidenced by how entertaining his works are and by their success. Only an idiot, who is incapable or unwilling to differentiate between fiction and non-fiction, would "take his books seriously" in any way other than as entertainment.

[old_sage_says]

I thought "Angels and Demons" was better than "The Da Vinci Code".

Both books are works of fiction and nothing else.

I still feel better after reading anything that Vince Flynn pens. Mitch Rapp is the man.

[DakotaGator]

If you are looking at the script on the "torn" section of the Mona Lisa, it's merely reverse writing in a pleasant longhand. Hold it up to a mirror for legibility.

The DVC is a pleasant airport book. But it should not in any way be taken seriously. Though the author rightfully classifies it as fiction, he unforgivably cited falsehoods as fact.

For example; The so-called Priory of Sion is a huge falsehood presented as fact immediately following the second title page. This "Fact" page claims the Priory of Sion is real. The DVC is built around the Priory of Sion's existence. Yet the Priory of Sion was a latter half 20th Century hoax perpetrated by a forger. He was caught in the act and confessed to such in French court. Any cursory research would have revealed this to Dan Brown.

So, the DVC is a fun read but in no way a source of "light".

Enjoy.

[Sacajaweau]

Well, wouldn't that be interesting if it translated into that. I took four years of Latin but 40 years later, the mind is dim. I'll go to the Library though.

The snitch Mason, Mr. Morgan, is buried in a cemetery near me. Pure politics at that time. Someone once told me that the Masons were attached somehow to the Shriners. Does that make sense?

[printhead]

I'll wait for the paperback version. Or maybe used at amazon.