Book Review: Origin (By Dan Brown)

Dan Brown’s Origin seems to leave readers harshly divided. You either hate it or love it. That happens to be true for most of his books, though. I had really enjoyed The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons. I remember his other books being alright. They had some good parts and some pretty ridiculous ones.

Origin, though, was a different kind of ‘alright’. And in the interest of sharing all my thoughts (which, I admit, are a bit all over the place), I’m making this review a little different. Read on to know more!

Genre: 

Mystery, Thriller

Length: 

456 pages

Blurb:

Futurist, billionaire, and Robert Langdon’s old student, Edmond Kirsch, is hosting a major announcement at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. Langdon and a closely vetted list of exclusive guests have been invited to the event that little is known about but that has promised to “change the world of science and religion forever”. Kirsch’s announcement aims to answer two of human existence’s fundamental questions. But the presentation turns out to be much more controversial than expected, threatening the very foundation of all religion. But Kirsch is assassinated in the moments before his big announcement. As chaos erupts, Langdon finds himself forced to escape Bilbao. With him is the beautiful Ambra Vidal – fiancée of the Crown Prince of Spain and Director of the museum who helped Kirsch put the presentation together. They both attempt to uncover and release Kirsch’s mysterious discovery before it is lost forever. But the man who assassinated Kirsch will stop at nothing to keep the announcement unaired. And that is not the only obstacle in Langdon and Vidal’s way as they traverse the world of enigmatic symbols and modern art… all in an attempt to avenge their dead friend and ensure that his discovery is made public.

Overall Rating:

3 out of 10

The Review:

Let’s jump right into it!

Dan Brown’s Origin is okay at best. It’s really, really slow throughout. Sure there’s some action going on. But the entire premise is how Kirsch would answer two crucial questions:

• Where did we come from?
• Where are we going?

Except, because of how often these questions are posed in an attempt to generate excitement in the reader… you simply end up not caring.

I mean, by the time I was a few chapters in, my feelings could be summarized as, “Interesting premise. Too bad I don’t give too much of a damn about finding the answers.”

But!

It does just enough to keep you sort of interested to see it to the end. Which is also a bit of a letdown after all that hype. The book definitely has action – murders, conspiracy, and suspense. But its pace just doesn’t allow you to really get into it. The story itself is okay, with different arcs running in parallel as they often do in dan Brown’s work. It attempts to build a lot of hype as it heads to its climax, only to fall pretty flat. If you’re a big Robert Langdon fan, you might enjoy Origin. Although, if you love the art that the Langdon books focus on, you might want to skip this one, which is based more on modern art.

I’m definitely disappointed at how this turned out, even though I hadn’t gotten into it with high expectations in the first place. It was the first book I picked up in 2022 and was a slow start to the year for sure. But I’ve got other books lined up (and read) so more reviews are definitely coming up soon.

Share your thoughts on Dan Brown, his books, and his characters in the comments below. And as always, thanks for stopping by The Book Review Station and reading this review!

– Rishika

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