Mr.Yankees wrote:Since you don't know me, I will be soft. I have read more than one hundred books easily. You do not get a Ph.D if you don't read that much. So, please don't talk about what you don't know.
And while I have no problem with you not liking the book, it's a good piece of fiction. Not the best, obviously, but good nevertheless.
I still recommend reading the book before watching the movie.
Hmmm. I'm going to be generous and assume that the figure of one hundred books was in error (a quick calculation tells me that the shelves in the room I'm in alone contains over three times that number and I'm not a particularly voracious reader anyway). However, I'm genuinely interested to know what the books you've been reading are, such that you think
The Da Vinci Code qualifies as good. So out of interest, if tDVC isn't one of your favourite books, what are?
Anyway: I'm not criticising
Angels and Demons for it's accessibility (there are a lot of brilliant; easily accessible authors- Sir Terry Pratchett being a classic example), just for its unconvincing, highly generic characterisation (note that he uses essentially the same templates for his characters in all four books), ineffectual cliffhangers and hopelessly inept plotting. It's one of those rare books (off the top of my head, the only other such book I can think of is
Eragon) that I actually think I could have written better and believe me, I'm under no illusions about my lack of writing talent...
As to the last part: well obviously. I'd recommend that for any film, although it has the significant disadvantage that very few films actually live up to the book they're based on, so you often end up feeling a bit cheated. (Molotov's list, plus
Stardust is about all I can think of off the top of my head). Plus there are the cases like
Northen Lights/The Golden Compass where the source material is so horrifically butchered that you just cannot stand the film.