The marketing machine for The Lost Symbol, Dan Brown’s save-publishing sequel to The Da Vinci Code, kicks in to overdrive today at Amazon.com, where the retailer is hawking the book harder than anything since its own Kindle. Blocking the front page today is an overwritten note, as ludicrous and clunky as anything Dan Brown has ever written, touting Amazon’s fearsome security system.
“The book remains so deeply under wraps that we’d agreed to keep our stockpile under 24-hour guard in its own chain-link enclosure, with two locks requiring two separate people for entry.”
A 24-hour guard? (Does Amazon typically leave its warehouses unguarded?) Two locks? (Amazon sells 26,297 locks in its Tools & Home-Improvement section.) A chain-link fence! (What, no laser beams? No giant boulder hidden behind a pressure-triggered statue?) If the plot of the The Lost Symbol is as fraught, it will be the lamest thriller ever.
Here are the only five security systems we could think of that would be less intimidating:
secured in a giant lemon Jell-O mold, guarded by three cats.”
“ left in the food court, under the watchful eyes of Ronnie Barnhardt and Paul Blart.”
“ camouflaged by the hairpiece of Tom Hanks.”
“ tucked under the Constitution of the United States.”
“ buried under Dan Brown’s talent.”