The Secret of Secrets
Robert Langdon, esteemed professor of symbology, travels to Prague to attend a groundbreaking lecture by Katherine Solomon—a prominent noetic scientist with whom he has recently begun a relationship. Katherine is on the verge of publishing an explosive book that contains startling discoveries about the nature of human consciousness and threatens to disrupt centuries of established belief. But a brutal murder catapults the trip into chaos, and Katherine suddenly disappears along with her manuscript. Langdon finds himself targeted by a powerful organization and hunted by a chilling assailant sprung from Prague’s most ancient mythology. As the plot expands into London and New York, Langdon desperately searches for Katherine... and for answers. In a thrilling race through the dual worlds of futuristic science and mystical lore, he uncovers a shocking truth about a secret project that will forever change the way we think about the human mind.
Stats for nerds
2recommend
5mentions
5people
2025–2026years
40% recommend60% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- FINISHED:
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- A Skill Called Luck by Jakob Greenfeld (very good)
- Unf*ck Your Sales by Jakob Greenfeld (very good)
- Books by Alex West (very good)
- How to Live by Derek Sivers (very very good)
- Secret of Secrets by Dan Brown (really enjoyed it)
- The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing (it's okay)
- The Narrow Road by Felix Dennis (it's okay)
- Oh Crap! Potty Training by Jamie Glowacki (success)
- Вишнёвый Сад Чехов Антон Павлович (did not like it at all)
- Gulliver's Travels Jonathan Swift (liked it)
- Hunt, Gather, Parent Michaeleen Doucleff (this book is a game changer, strong recommend for every parent)
- MAKE by Pieter Levels
- Main Street Millionaire by Codie Sanchez
- Start Small, Stay Small by Rob Walling
- The Sweaty Startup by Nick Huber
- The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury (did not like it at all)
- Чем Люди Живы Лев Николаевич Толстой (nice)
- 80/20 Sales and Marketing by Perry Marshall (pretty good)
- Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl (eye opening)
- Growth Levers and How to Find Them by Matt Lerner (meh)
- Alexander Pushking Stories (very nice. crazy how he makes rhymes yet the whole thing makes sense)
IN_PROGRESS:
- War and Piece (I'm shocked at how much I'm liking it)
- Scaling Fast by Swizec Teller (really good, about to finish)
- Unreasonable Hospitality (it alright)
- Mom Test (it's good, but for some reason I keep failing to finish it)
- Marcus Aurelius Meditations (reading it slowly as inspiration strikes)
- Seneca Dialogues
- Ultimate Guide to Link Building by Garrett French
STARTED, BUT DID NOT FINISH (That's a big add list):
- Michel de Montaigne "Essays"
- Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (feels to hard to tackle right now)
- Seeking Wisdom
- Product Led Growth
- Demand Side Sales
- Odyssey by Homer
- Full Stack Tao by Alex Kondov
- Logic for Programmers
- The Story of Philosophy
- The Story of Civilization Vol 1
- The Communist Manifesto Karl Marx
- Economic Facts and Fallacies Thomas Sowell
- The Beginning of Infinity David Deutsch
- Obviously Awesome by April Dunford
- SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome Mary Beard
- American Kingpin by Nick Bilton (it's good, just felt irrelevant, will revisit)
- Indexing Beyond the Basics by Tobias Petry (only read it when necessary)
- The Mind Illuminated by John Yates (can't keep meditations to stick)
Note:
- I keep notes on books I finished on my site, but need to bring it up to date: https://www.rasulkireev.com/book-notes/
- Since we're of a certain level of interest and openness, I'll throw a pop fiction title into the mix: Dan Brown's /Secret of Secrets/ for a tip toe through the non-local mind and soul topic. It's a 4 index card book for me - meaning I have 4 index cards of notes, references, and words worthy of reflection or research. Pretty good for a fiction best seller.
- reminds me of Dan Brown's latest book: The Secret of Secrets.
- I stopped reading newspapers long back (early 2010s). During the Pandemic, I started a newspaper subscription (very common in India, delivered to the home) so I can use it to segregate wet waste properly. I started reading bits and pieces: horrors/misfortunes sell; news is stale, etc. Of late, I decided to look at it from a different angle, bringing back my childhood nostalgia, when I devoured every piece of reading material I could find. Now, I pick the ones I want to read, marking them as a reminder of continuity, a small bridge to a past life. I’m going to continue this slow reading with Newspapers. Wrote an article about my feelings, scheduled to be published on my personal blog in 2026-JAN.
For books, this year has been the year with the fewest books read.[1] I ended up reading the past: John Keats’s Poems, Marcus Aurelius, The Great Gatsby, Odyssey, and Iliad by Homer.
As a habit and a tribute to something I liked in the past, I read Dan Brown’s latest, “The Secret of Secrets.” I also started re-reading some of Sidney Sheldon’s books, but, as of this day, I could no longer summon the enthusiasm to continue beyond Master of the Game and The Sands of Time.
I also re-read the fantastic book, “Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions”[2] by Edwin Abbott Abbott.
- I read 52 books this year:
- Be Useful by Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Discipline Equals Freedom by Jocko Willink
- Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink
- The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt
- The Coddling of the American Mind by Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff
- When the Body Says No by Gabor Maté
- Dopamine Nation by Anna Lembke
- The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer
- Standing Strong by John MacArthur
- The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
- We Who Wrestle with God by Jordan B. Peterson
- I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist by Norman L. Geisler and Frank Turek
- The Holy Bible
- Son of Hamas by Mosab Hassan Yousef
- I Am Giorgia by Giorgia Meloni
- 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup
- The Two-Income Trap by Elizabeth Warren
- The Strange Death of Europe by Douglas Murray
- The Madness of Crowds by Douglas Murray
- The War on the West by Douglas Murray
- Porn Generation by Ben Shapiro
- The Authoritarian Moment by Ben Shapiro
- The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
- In Farleigh Field by Rhys Bowen
- Darkest Hour by Anthony McCarten
- Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
- The Secret of Secrets by Dan Brown
- Casino Royale by Ian Fleming
- Live and Let Die by Ian Fleming
- Moonraker by Ian Fleming
- Diamonds Are Forever by Ian Fleming
- From Russia with Love by Ian Fleming
- Dr No by Ian Fleming
- Goldfinger by Ian Fleming
- For Your Eyes Only by Ian Fleming
- Thunderball by Ian Fleming
- The Spy Who Loved Me by Ian Fleming
- On Her Majesty's Secret Service by Ian Fleming
- You Only Live Twice by Ian Fleming
- The Man with the Golden Gun by Ian Fleming
- Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
- Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
- Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
- The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
- Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
- 1984 by George Orwell
- The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
- The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
Next year I will read more books of the Russian writers on this list. I enjoyed those books very much.
After seeing this list, what books do you recommend for me?
