After reading "Digital Fortress" I've finally read all four Dan Brown books to date and I find myself in a love/hate relationship with this author. I couldn't care less about the hype surrounding him because of "The Da Vinci Code". But despite having a great gift for writing engaging and suspenseful prose, for me Brown always loses himself three quarters of the way in. In other circumstances, it's falling in old boring clichés. Here the plot just becomes a laughing stock for anyone who's even remotely computer-savvy.

In "Digital Fortress", two different plots are interleaved, one happening at the NSA headquarters wherever that is and the other happening in Seville, Spain. None is believable, both are page-turners. Being the first of Brown's books, it seems this is the blueprint for what was to come. Inevitably someone dies in the prelude. Inevitably there's a hot chick with brains. Inevitably there's the innocent smart guy who has to figure out all the riddles and gets to keep the broad in the end. Meanwhile, some mean vicious assassin is repeatedly fooled along with his master, until they're eventually defeated. World is saved, all is well again, until the next adventure.

Put in perspective, this was still my second favorite Dan Brown book, following "Angels & Demons". There's that something in his writing that makes me come back but inevitably I reach the end in frustration. "Digital Fortress" was no exception, and even more so because it was really good until a certain point.