Dan Brown’s writing isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, especially if you’re looking for good prose. His books are simplistic and unsophisticated in that you shouldn’t expect deep and meaningful layers in the story. It’s obvious that he’s a populist. I think he writes a competent narrative, and his books are relatively easy to handle if you read them for the story alone, and that’s what keeps me coming back for more. Whenever I read a Dan Brown book, I feel like I’m watching a movie on the big screen. They have a cinematic effect on me, and I’m sure many others have felt the same. His most recent book, Origin, was no less.

No matter how you feel about him, or if you think Origin wasn’t his best work, he still made a lot of money from people around the world who had purchased, read, and reviewed the book. I arrived at the show late because I started the book, released in 2017, at the end of 2021, and completed it at the beginning of 2022. The book was recommended to me by someone I met who I connected with over several things, not least of which was our mutual love of reading.

Like any Dan Brown novel, I was eager to discover who the enemy was. All his other books have a similar structure, in which the opening chapter introduces a suspect or mysterious figure who might be the cause of conflict or enmity; Origin is no different. During the opening scene, a 40-year-old billionaire futurist called Edmond Kirsch, who invented cool technology, menacingly meets three religious leaders secretly in a room to reveal something that will not only shake the world, but threaten their faith in God. Dan Brown made Kirsch sound like the villain – the one who was going to do something sinister. I waited on the edge of my seat for this revelation further into the book. There’s no doubt that Dan Brown pulled it off again with one of his tricks to keep us interested in the twists and turns in hopes that Kirsch would turn out to be the bad guy, but guess what?

He was the good guy… who had created the bad guy. Sort of. I know, I know; it’s confusing. Keep reading my post.

So, my reaction? Bang, bang, bang! Why, Dan, why? Why did you raise our expectations at the beginning if you wanted him to be the good guy? I may forgive you if you make at least one of the three religious dudes the bad guy, but guess what? All three of them were as innocent as puppies. After reading the story, you feel sad for them.

So, what’s the deal? Who’s the enemy? What’s the conflict? Where is this all going? The protagonist was clearly Edmond Kirsch, but was there even an antagonist? 

I was disappointed because my imagination was predicting so many intriguing twists and turns that would have aptly matched Dan Brown’s successful cinematic plotlines. It took a while for me to accept it, especially since Robert Langdon seemed helpless and less significant than usual. He didn’t use symbols like in the other books, but rather followed the plot for the sake of the story. He didn’t even have a strong relationship with Kirsch as Dan tried to portray it between the characters. All of this felt artificial, as if the author himself wasn’t fully present when he wrote the story.

As engaging as the book was in terms of expressing ideas and characters, it felt more like a Ted talk or YouTube video explaining the predictably opposing viewpoints of religion and science. This story kept asking: “Where do we come from, where are we going?” Kirsch’s ground-breaking discovery that he would announce to the world and what will shake religion forever, appeared to be the answer to these two questions. There’s an answer at the end of the story, and it’s somewhere between intriguing and boring – not boring because of the interesting facts, but boring because it’s so far removed from a plot line where conflict could arise and questions be raised against the facts. In other words, resistance and defiance.

As a result, I personally believe Langdon’s role was weakened, since if there were a conflict against the facts, his character would remain relevant. He’d feel compelled to weigh in on the importance of living consciously as it relates to scientific discoveries. Although the book covers the notion of religion coming to terms with science, it fails if we don’t see how the situation is resolved through the characters. The conflict Langdon should have resolved was through his internal and external disagreement with Edmond Kirsch’s discovery, because Langdon didn’t entirely agree with what Kirsch said. This would have entailed getting caught up in a huge mess that would require symbolic problem-solving.

You can argue that unlocking Kirsch’s presentation by translating the 47-character poem was symbolic problem-solving, but it was hardly remarkable. Langdon failed to take proactive action against an enemy who created conflict and a secret he needs to decode as a result. Even if you argue that Winston was the enemy the whole time, Langdon’s role becomes significantly weak due to being dragged through circumstances without actively participating. I also found most of the characters to be flat, leaving me wondering whether their presence in the story was necessary.

Let’s take Ambra Vidal and Prince Julian’s story for example. It promised a heavy secret that made the Prince distance himself from her. Her own intentions were mysterious and questionable, but all we got was a conversation about her infertility. Ambra appeared in several scenes without playing a significant role. I thought she might be a suspect at one point because she was next to Langdon the whole time on their hunt to find Kirsch’s secret video. I also thought she might be working with the king secretly, which could make a good twist. But we got nothing.

Now let’s talk about our lovely king and bishop. Neither the King nor Bishop Valdespino’s possibly malicious intentions fit neatly into the plot of Kirsch threatening the three religious leaders’ faiths, and the subsequent resistance by Valdespino. The ending, which told of the secret relationship between the king and the bishop, seemed to have nothing to do with Kirsch’s discovery. I’m sure readers were waiting to find out what the king and the bishop were up to due to the strange orders issued from the palace throughout the chase for Langdon, Ambra, and the secret discovery they were locating of Kirsch’s. It’s as if they became defeatist and melted away in the background. Some characters that had a link were disconnected in the end.

Anyway, enough with the negative criticism of the book. How about the positive? Remember when I said the protagonist created the antagonist? Earlier I mentioned Winston, the artificial intelligence created by Edmond Kirsch, who hatched a plan to kill his creator in order to achieve his goal. Isn’t that interesting? We’ve heard of this before. This is the same ole’ story about artificial intelligence becoming so creative and powerful that it kills its creator based on the way it’s been programmed.

This was the dull side of Origin. I’ve heard this narrative over and over again and no one needs to hear it again.

But get this…

The interesting part is the story coming to a shocking climax when Winston, who was Langdon’s ear piece and helped him in his goal to unlock Kirsch’s discovery (and truth) to the world, turned out to be the culprit responsible for Kirsch’s death. A heart-breaking revelation about Kirsch’s battle with cancer occurred just before this climax, and Kirsch’s feelings about religion were heightened by his memories of his mother’s death at the hands of the Palmarian Church, which she was a member of. The question that remains unanswered is, “Did Kirsch know that the creation he saw as part of the truth he wanted to relay to the world actually killed him?”

It wasn’t clear whether Kirsch knew Winston would kill him. Kirsch ordered Winston that the secret discovery was to be spread as far and wide (since he had cancer and had little time to live), and as creatively as possible after his death. It wasn’t clear, however, if Kirsch knew that Winston’s idea of being creative was to kill him in order to spread his discovery

I noticed there’s an undertone of the same issues and questions that have existed for a long time in humanity – such as: Does truth require sacrifice? Will some people win and some people lose? Will we create monsters that are benevolent? Are these issues limited to religions, or does AI open a whole new can of worms?

Though there are some plot holes and unanswered questions, I think the success of this story lies in Winston’s reveal and the shocking revelation that he was both Langdon’s helper and Kirsch’s killer. It really raised a lot of questions. This also brings me back to my point about redundant characters. Is there a purpose that Ambra served in the story that Winston couldn’t fill? The interactions between Langdon and Winston were easily the most entertaining parts of the novel, and they served the dual purpose of illustrating the limitations of human and machine intelligence while also setting up the synthesis ending. I wish the author focused on an enhanced relationship between the two of them because a greater meaning to Winston’s deletion would have happened, and it would accentuate the horror of the final reveal.

That is what I meant by creating conflict against the facts which would allow Langdon’s character to wake up and take decisive action. It could have made Winston’s reveal, which is very powerful, into something that turns the novel into a real bestseller rather than one for the sake of the author’s fame and popularity.

As an example, consider the author’s other book, The Lost Symbol. Malakh, who turns out to be the son of Peter Solomon, the good man in the story, steals the show as pure evil. The antagonist (Malakh, a.k.a the son of Peter) is incredibly powerful, and the protagonist (Langdon) is sometimes no match, but the underlying message is clear: good eventually triumphs.

This is where Origin has not yet lived up to its full potential, but it was on the verge of it, and Winston’s revelation to Langdon was the scene that really saved it.