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- The Rule of Four
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- Authors: Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason
- Reviewer: Sonali T. Sikchi
- Publisher: Dial Press (2004)
- ISBN: 0385337116
- Rating: * * * * Quills
- www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/asin/0385337116/scriquil
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- With their debut bildungsroman, Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason have accomplished what legions of teachers have failed to do -- made nerdism fashionable. Striking the right note between the thrilling action of Dan Brown, the erudition of A.S. Byatt and Umberto Eco, and the compassion of Donna Tartt, the young authors have made the excitement and discovery of books and the elitism of the Ivy League accessible to the bourgeoisie.
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- In the course of the story, we follow four seniors Tom, Paul, Charlie and Gil during their last term at Princeton as they struggle with the demands of academics, friendship, romance, loyalty, and the choices and decisions at each moral and ethical crossroad.
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- The lives of Tom and Paul, in particular, unfold against the forefront of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili. This fifteenth century Renaissance oeuvre has defied comprehension by scholars throughout the ages. Ciphers, riddles, and philosophical, literary, artistic and scientific symbolism and scholarship are embedded in the deceptively benign story. For Paul, the book is an all-consuming obsession -- not just the romantic pull of hidden treasure, but the addiction of pitting his mind against those of the author and other Princetonian scholars, including Tom's deceased father, to solve what other scholars have failed to do. While Tom feels the irresistible tow of the intellectual puzzle, his fascination is complicated by his agonizingly opposing feelings for his father and his father's seduction by the Hypnerotomachia.
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- A murder on campus shocks Tom and Paul into an awareness of the imminent danger into which the book has put their lives. It galvanizes them in a race against time to solve the book's final puzzles to decipher the mysterious author's intricately hidden meanings.
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- Dazzling scholarship, high drama, allure of a bygone era and stupendous imagination are the hallmarks of this fictional debut. On rare occasions, the dialog is amateurish, but that is the worst to be said about this stellar work of fiction. The authors hope to have a second book out in two years, and anticipation is high to see what they have in store for us next.
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