The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown I bought the hard cover deluxe illustrated edition for m/zeit a few years back and it had been in the bookcase. Had to go to a sleep study and they said bring a book.
The illustrations are definitely worth the extra cost of the hardcover. Lots of great Washington pictures that are seldom seen. A typical Dan Brown thriller / page turner.
for those interested a DUmmy link on Dan Brown writing one featuring Mormons:
http://upload.democraticunderground.com/1002644328
One of my biggest disappointments in life was NOT reading The Lost Symbol before going to Washington DC. to vacation for a week 3-4 times in my life.
All we could do was to wander about and wonder at some of the" out of place" stuff we saw on the older buildings.
Every thing from Owls on roof tops to bats in stone under the eves.
One place near DuPont Circle that was a very old stone mansion with iron gates and a discreet sign "Guests only"
fascinated me. We had detailed maps that named the places of interest, ----our B&B was across from the Chinese Embassy for instance but this place was not even on the map.
No way to know if this was a private home, owned by some government, Hubby kind of went with a very high price whore house for wealthy dignitary's. I had to control my curiosity as he forbid me from knocking on the door.
The whole city is so full of ancient symbols right out in sight that people walk right past and pay no attention to.
We have in the next town an old brick building build in the WPA days that had a couple of bats in flight worked into the stone. Few noticed them but one theory was the stone masons that built the building had a reason to put them there. It has been said that there are still plenty of the WPA projects left intact that if one looks closely will find odd things that no one knows about or will tell the significance of.
Right in our own back yard, symbols hidden in plain sight.
