Codex

...by Lev Grossman

Banker, Edward, hired by wealthy (noble) client to find an ancient manuscript that may or may not even exist. There's something hidden within the manuscript that could be damaging. Parallel plot is that he's given a video game by his college friend which seems to parallel the history of the manuscript. Edward stumbles upon a scholarly girl, Margaret, who helps him.

This was such a promising book---one of those 'hidden secrets in old books' sort of stories that I usually love! It started off well enough: 'unsuspecting protagonist that stumbles into a puzzle to be solved that comsumes his every thought'; except it didn't, really. He played the reluctant hero throughout, which only works if the reluctant hero only pushes on because something is at stake (either moral or financial would have been ok; but there was nothing---he had a good career already, he wasn't the least bit knowledgable or even interested in his quarry; he wasn't even in love with the girl.) It simply wasn't believable that this particular character would be drawn into this. Even towards the end, on one page he was ready to chuck his career, and on the next, he was saying he'd never let anything get in the way of it. He didn't know who he was. This would have been ok, had it been a growth process, but he was the same person in chapter one that he was on the last page.

The plot concept was awesome! Very interesting how the author told parallel stories; one the historical account of a lost manuscript, the other the progression of a mysterious video game that 'fell' into Edward's hands. This part was frustrating to me. I thought that part of the plot would devolop differently, like maybe the college friend would be 'in on it', but he wasn't. This would have been an awesome place for conflict that just never took place. The first half of the book did a good job of laying the foundations, but the second half just hurried through everything and ended without a notable climax in the story at all. We read every detail of how Margaret (Edward's Medieval expert) unobtrusively picked the lock on an ancient book, but skimmed through her cracking the code within a code (the main object of their search) on the first try. I guess that was the climax, because after that, everything just fell into place. Even the bad guys (if you can call them that--I'm not really sure), talked tough at one point, and I though, oh, now we've got some conflict--I knew this would get better, only to be frightened off when Edward's college buddy happened to show up and say something to the effect of, 'leave him alone' (I knew he was in this story for some reason). That, apparently, was enough, even though a noble family's fortune, birthright, and reputation for all of history was at stake. You'd think they could have afforded better thugs. We saw no more bad guys for the rest of the novel. At this point, I was really hoping for the college buddy, or Margaret, or somebody, to be hiding something--throw me a curve, cause the story is flat. Even the explaination of the video game was dull, and I had high hopes for that. And as far as what was at stake--I don't get that, either. We weren't given sufficient background info on the Duke and Dutchess to warrent their quarrel. I'm not saying it couldn't have been, but the reader wasn't given enough to indicate a reason why one would turn on the other. AND, on top of all of that, the 'secret' they found within the manuscript--I'm not sure that it would have been solid enough to ruin a man. Alot could be read into what was found, but I don't think it would have held up without further documentation--just my opinion.

There was no satisfying resolution to this story. Good didn't win, evil didn't win. Nobody won. It seemed to me the author may have been leaving options open for a sequil. There still needs to be some resolution. He could have left one little thread hanging that would have served as an invitation to write more later (Luke, I'm your father....sorry, I digress). It felt to me that the author got tired of writing, and wanted to 'wrap it up' and be done with it.

This could have been great, but the plotline was under developed and the characters were flat.

Iknow from reading the back cover that this author is a book critic. I feel a little bad, and hope he doesn't see this; it's just my opinion; but I gotta call it as I see it.