A literary prank leads to deadly danger in this “endlessly diverting” intellectual thriller by the author of The Name of the Rose (Time). Bored with their work, three Milanese book editors cook up an elaborate hoax that connects the medieval Knights Templar with occult groups across the centuries. Becoming obsessed with their own creation, they produce a map indicating the geographical point … indicating the geographical point from which all the powers of the earth can be controlled—a point located in Paris, France, at Foucault’s Pendulum.
But in a fateful turn the joke becomes all too real. When occult groups, including Satanists, get wind of the Plan, they go so far as to kill one of the editors in their quest to gain control of the earth. Orchestrating these and other diverse characters into his multilayered semiotic adventure, Umberto Eco has created a superb cerebral entertainment.
“An intellectual adventure story…sensational, thrilling, and packed with arcana.”—The Washington Post Book World
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Umberto Eco’s sharp, meticulously detailed novel feels like a better, satirical version of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (a book I enjoyed when I read it several years ago), despite the fact that Eco’s novel was published fifteen years before Brown’s. Foucault’s Pendulum is a multilayered thriller that offers and challenging, enjoyable and …
An intellectual thriller. If you read the Name of the Rose, this is a great follow up
The conspiracy theory to end all conspiracy theories – Foucault’s Pendulum is a mad romp filled with the most esoteric references. It takes a little while to get going, but settles down once you realize that Eco is satirizing the endless theorizing around religious secret societies. There is nothing else quite like it, except The Da Vinci Code – …
Umberto Eco knows how to write and how to make you want to read.
My favourite novel from my favourite author!
Umberto Eco was one of the most difficult authors that I ever chose to read. The Name Of The Rose is possibly his best known novel. Foucault’s Pendulum is one of the most difficult to read. The first time I read it I loaned it to a friend and asked him to let me know what I had read when he finished his reading. It is not light reading. It is …
Getting through Eco’s works is always like trudging through mud – never an “enjoyable” read.
This is most definitely not easy to read, but it is a brilliant story once you get into it, I tell people it’s an extraordinarily smart Dan Brown, much better done.
It cured me of conspiracy theory.
When everything that exists is connected, nothing is free from the conspiracy…
This book recreates the experience of being exposed to, believing in, then getting out of, a conspiracy mindset. To read this book is to be befuddled, then revealed and connected, then to doubt, and finally to resist belief itself. There are certain books that do …
For those who want something deeper, more complex, and much more nuanced than The Davinci Code, this is the perfect choice. This involves cabals, mysterious characters, and vast amounts of history, but it is elevated like only Umberto Eco can make it, while being tragic, wry, and involving. Some may find it a challenge; stick with it. It’s worth …