The defective drum kit

I’ve been wary about discussing Dan Brown’s latest masterpiece, partly because I haven’t read it (although it sounds as if he just went through his last tome and replaced every instance of the word ‘Catholic’ with ‘Freemason’) but mainly because he really doesn’t need the publicity, which could go to more worthy authors such as my virtual chum Bête de Jour and my meatspace chum Nick Pegg (the 473rd edition of whose Bowie book is out any day now) and someone else whose name temporarily escapes me.

But I must point you towards this list of Brown’s most egregious crimes against the English language, which is funny in itself, and then gets quite glorious as DB’s admirers take up cudgels in defence of their idol. Observations along the lines of

Perhaps because this style (sometimes superfluous, sometimes over-dramatic, sometimes completely nonsensical) is simply a more fancy, brushed up version of how a lot of people think or speak?

may sound like the product of effete snobbery until we come across

American’s (like Mr. Brown) do not only have problems with grammatical sensibilities they also have issues with basic numerousy.

Fear not, though, Danny boy. You have a friend among your fellow authors. Unfortunately, it’s John Grisham, who really can’t see why everyone’s having a pop at you. I mean, after all,

Of course, I've read literature in the classic sense. We’ve all got those type of books on the shelves at home. They made me read them at school and I admit that I didn't like them much. I couldn’t understand why they were said to be so good.

PS: Michael Baigent, who admits to having a bit of a history with Brown, identifies what it is that annoys so many of us with Mr Da Vinci. It’s not so much the stupidity of his books as their delusions of cleverness:

It is as if Brown wants us to think that he is a great scholar rather than a deft hand at computer searching.