The Secret of Secrets - Dan Brown --------------------- 4 Stars

Well, it's finally come to this, after 17 years and over 275 blog posts, the AI guest writer is here. Background - I had AI read all of my blog posts and then asked it to write the review for Dan Brown's recent release, The Secret of Secrets. Below is a fully AI/Gemini created blog post with every word computer generated.

A few observations:

1. Wow, this pretty dang good and quite similar to how I write. The structure is pretty similar to my blog posts, its conversational and direct (which I try to do), and fairly honest and opinionated (also me!).

2. Substantively, it covered a number of things I would have noted. Of course, the reference to The Da Vinci Code being such a great novel/cultural phenomenon. I totally agree with the strengths and weaknesses shared and felt the conclusion paragraph was almost exactly how I might have planned to end this blog post.

3. Mistakes/Misses - It's a bit too tongue in cheek. While I love that the AI referenced my earlier negative review for The Idiot, I'm not sure I'd call it out as a "slog" in this blog post. I also don't think I would have written the cringey, "The setup is classic Brown" but maybe I'm giving myself too much credit (likely the AI knows a lot more about what I've written than I do). I definitely did not Google anything to see if it was real, though maybe I should have if it thought I did. I don't think I would have choose the word "woke" when referencing religion and quantum mechanics (I think I've only mentioned work and one blog post though it was recently (UPDATE  - I just asked AI to check how many "woke" mentions in the blog and it said twice - September and December last year. I have no idea if that is right, but definitely don't wanna go back and read 300 blogs). Finally, this book was over 600 pages long; no idea where it got 400.

4. Finally, while it's been fun to observe, appreciate, and critique this AI generated post, it's unlikely I'll use AI to write these in the future. Truly, what would be the point of that? One of the main purposes of this blogs to continue maintaining and developing my writing skills and also sharing my love of recent books. If nothing else, it was an interesting experiment. 

Also, The Secret of Secrets is pretty entertaining read; you should check it out.

It has been a minute since I’ve picked up a Dan Brown novel. Like many of you, I blew through The Da Vinci Code years ago and found the Robert Langdon formula to be the ultimate "guilty pleasure" reading. When I saw his latest, The Secret of Secrets, pop up on my Libby app with no wait time, I figured it was time to see if the old dog had any new tricks.

The setup is classic Brown: a high-ranking official at the CERN laboratory is found dead in a room that shouldn't exist, clutching a coded cylinder. Enter our favorite symbologist, Robert Langdon, who has to sprint across Geneva to prevent a discovery that would—naturally—change the world as we know it.

The Strengths: If there is one thing Dan Brown knows how to do, it’s pacing. This book is a literal track meet. I found myself flying through chapters because they almost all end on a cliffhanger. It has that "just one more chapter before bed" quality that I really missed after slogs like The Idiot. Langdon remains a solid "thinking man's hero." I’ve always appreciated that he wins with his brain and a tweed jacket rather than a gun. Also, the historical tidbits about the early days of alchemy were actually pretty fascinating—I found myself Googling a few things to see if they were real (most were!).

The Negatives: Unfortunately, the "formula" is starting to show its age. If you’ve read more than two of these, you can almost set your watch by when the "shocking" betrayal is going to happen. There’s a female sidekick who is—stop me if you’ve heard this—the most brilliant person in her field but mostly exists to ask Langdon questions so he can explain things to the reader.

Also, the "science" in this one gets a bit... out there. There were stretches where I felt like the author was trying a bit too hard to be "woke" about the intersection of religion and quantum physics, and it felt a little pandering. It didn't quite have the stakes of his earlier work, and the "big reveal" at the end felt more like a 3-star payoff than a 5-star mind-blower.

Overall: Is it East of Eden? Not even close. But is it a fun, 400-page sprint that kept me engaged while I was on the treadmill? Absolutely. If you’re looking for something deep and life-changing, keep moving. But if you want a reliable page-turner that doesn't require a PhD to follow (even if it pretends to), it’s worth the time. It landed right in the middle for me—better than his last one, but not quite reaching the heights of the classics.