I had such high hopes for this book. I love anything Atlantis so I was excited to read anything related to it. I had a really hard time finishing this book. I don't know what it was exactly that turned me off, maybe it's predictability? It wasn't terrible but, it wasn't all that good either.

I just couldn't suspend my disbelief on this one, and didn't care about the characters much either.

A minor annoyance - it seemed that female characters were constantly crossing their arms "over their breasts" or "under their breasts." Yeah - I get it - women have breasts. The only time I remember a man doing it he just "crossed his arms."

I wish I could have given this book 3&1/2 stars. The main reason that I liked it was almost solely because of the subject matter. I've always been fascinated by the Atlantis legend, so I was easily hooked because of that. Unfortunately this book was so completely formulaic. It's really fun and exciting - a nonstop thriller, but too cliche to even begin to describe. I wasn't shocked by any of the "twists," but they were fun and exciting nonetheless. It's very similar to all of Dan Brown's books, in fact this book could have been written by Dan Brown, but he probably would have written it better. I mean...just look at the title. And the main character is a linguists professor. I mean...can we at least try to be a little different? One major thing that bothered me was how the sexual scenes in this book literally came out of nowhere and were extremely "descriptive" for absolutely no reason. It threw the entire book off and just felt awkward. Yet despite all of this, I still really enjoyed myself. Maybe I shouldn't want to admit that. But as long as you start this book with an open mind and your goal is simply to enjoy yourself and read a fun book, you'll have a great ride.

I thought this book was trying too hard to be like the DaVinci Code. The main character was a linguist (similar to an expert on codes) who was sucked into an adventure. It wasn't bad enough to quit reading and it picked up a little at the end.

Plenty of action and interesting book. However, it took me almost two weeks to get through it and I don't know why. Normally I would fly through it in 3 - 4 days. Hmmm.

I didn't finish this book. It's awful. I wouldn't recommend it :/

I was mildly disappointed with this book. It took me longer than usual to finish it, like when I read [b:The Alexandria Link: A Novel|74824|The Alexandria Link A Novel (Cotton Malone #2)|Steve Berry|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170865291s/74824.jpg|1407664]. Be warned that nothing really exciting happens until about three quarters of the way in--a long time to wait for the juicy bits. The character was not endearing in any way, I found myself unable to relate to him, which was odd because Brokaw clearly intended for him to be a knock-off of Brown's Langdon. It generally lacked any qualities to pull the reader in, and in the end, didn't even tell the reader what s/he really wanted to know. In these types of thrillers, the reader expects a certain amount of mystery, and certain things to remain secret, but this was kind of ridiculous. Also, if you don't believe in God, this will be a disappointing read for you.

Brokaw’s book goes from 0-60 in the first chapter and doesn’t let up until the final page. The plot continually builds tension and moves forward at a page-turning pace. As each new clue is revealed, twists and turns keep the reader guessing even though the title is a giveaway for the general plot.

Lourdes is a character you either love or hate. I loved his blasé attitude, his ability to not let romance cloud his judgement for the most part, and his realistic reactions to each character that crosses his path. He’s an adrenaline junkie, and the author mixes that well with his logical academic side. Natashya’s character, the Russian detective, takes no prisoners and makes no apologies. Her focus — avenging her sister’s death — remains strong throughout the book, though she is not totally averse to having some late-night fun with Lourds.

However, there were a few things that were a bit tough to swallow. Leslie, the TV reporter, was such a cliché character. There were chapters that were hard to read because she was acting like a childish YA high schooler. I understood she was an easy conquest for Lourds, even though she initiated all their romantic encounters, but I found myself rolling my eyes every time she was spilling secrets trying to advance her career or attempting to seduce Lourds. The villains, mainly the Cardinal and his hired hitmen, were also cliché. Kill anyone who gets in the way, trying to control the world, destroying history instead of learning from it.

While I could overlook these character flaws — no one sees an action movie for character development — I cannot let go of the information dumps Brokaw consistently used throughout the book. Having a character explain a concept or a piece of history is fine, but to have chapters of explanation and the same characters droning on all the time is a bit much.

I gave this book a 4 star rating. It was fun and entertaining, and I could see it being adapted for the movie screen. It is very reminiscent of Dan Brown, but then again, any thriller involving the Catholic Church published after his first novel will read that way.