Comments on: Dan Brown: How Does He Do It?

By: McKenna

McKenna — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 21:45:40 +0000

I think Dan Brown is brilliant and there are too many jealous haters hope I can write as well someday : )

By: Blue.Skies

Blue.Skies — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 22:33:13 +0000

Yeah, I know, I left the i out of plagiarism.
And it should be script writers not script writer’s.
And as far as Jack McClane saying he doesn’t care if there are factual errors in the book that’s his choice but the tradition of fiction writing is one of not screwing your readers. Every author is prone to a mistake now and then but most authors put a lot of effort into true research knowing that their readers trust them. But discovered early on that he can dupe adult readers the same way Meyers can dupe thirteen-year-olds. At least with Meyer’s books and her target audience’s age it’s not only understandable but acceptable.

By: Blue.Skies

Blue.Skies — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 22:15:01 +0000

Are you kidding me? Reading Brown’s books are like running over cobblestones barefoot. Every bumpy sentence is a painful reminder that it’s going to be a long arduous journey.
Research? At least half the “facts” in his book Angels and Demons is inaccurate.
Great character? The character of Robert Langdon in the book was an incredibly flat, two-dimentional character. It is simply a testament to the talent of Tom Hanks the the character is so engaging in the movie.
Great storyteller? Try master plagerist instead. How many times has Brown been sued for plagerism?
When a book becomes a movie, as we all know (Well at least those of us who actually read a book before seeing the movie) the movie is never exactly like the movie. There are very good reasons for that one of which is molding a 300 something page book into a 120 page script. But in Brown’s case it’s because the script writer’s cleaned up Brown’s mess.
Controversy? Oh, please. If you have to create drama outside of your novel to sell it maybe you should just write soap operas. After all how much controversy do other authors have to create to sell their books to loyal fans? What are the controversy factors for Dean Koontz, Danielle Steele, Stephen King, Joh Grisham, Janet Evanovich, and so on? They all have loyal readers but they keep the drama IN the stories.

By: Lessons Learnt From Dan Brown: The Lost Symbol by Joanna Penn | The Creative Penn

Mon, 21 Sep 2009 06:22:02 +0000

[...] have written some lessons learnt from Dan before, so what else can we learn from the launch of ‘The Lost [...]

By: Jack McClane

Jack McClane — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 03:22:10 +0000

I don’t care if there are factual errors in it. It is a story and sold as fiction, not non-fiction. His job is to entertain us, not educate us and I think he does that terrifically. If I want to learn about the Freemasons or The Illuminati then I will research them using non-fiction books available at all libraries or via the web.

I started The Lost Symbol last night and am thoroughly enjoying it.

By: David Hill

David Hill — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:48:09 +0000

As far as I can tell, if a writer’s going to talk incessantly about his extensive knowledge and research on a topic, leaning on how speculative his speculative fiction is, he should consider being more realistic than not. Making up facts about the Louvre distracts from the “nonfictional fiction” of his prose.

By: Joanna

Joanna — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 08:48:20 +0000

Hey Livia,
It is still a fiction novel – so aren’t factual errors allowed?
or should it based on truth?

Thanks, Joanna

By: Livia

Livia — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 23:05:38 +0000

Uh, are you sure Dan Brown does his research? From what I’ve heard, The Da Vinci Code has quite a few factual errors.

By: Jack McClane

Jack McClane — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 23:32:52 +0000

Joanna

Great little piece on Dan Brown. I love the story telling of the Langdon series and I have been waiting patiently for the 3rd installment. I have read The DaVinci Code twice and Angels and Demons 4 times. I also love both movies. Angels and Demons is by far my favourite book of his. His other 2 non Langdon books were ok but I am glad he has stuck to the formula for The Lost Symbol. It has been pre-ordered since July!

Can’t wait.

Nice blog by the way. Thanks for your tips.

Jack

By: David Hill

David Hill — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 18:16:58 +0000

The reason you’ve never heard of another character in fiction who was a Symbologist is because there’s no such thing. Semiotics is probably the word Dan Brown was looking for, but his research seems to have failed him.