The Jefferson Key by Steve Berry, spoiler free.

 The Jefferson Key (spoiler free).

I love history. It's truly fascinating and I could spend hours and hours reading books and articles, listening to podcasts or even watching videos explaining historical events. One of my hobby is also to go to museums. 

When I started to see reading as a hobby, back in my last year of elementary school, I only read thrillers, my favorite author being Agatha Christie. Then, I discovered others works and famous authors of this genre and it naturally lead to historical thrillers, like Dan Brown. 

After quarantine time but when there was a curfew, I went to a bookshop, looking for a present for my best friend's birthday. That's when I stumbled across Steve Berry, that I never heard about before. All of his works seemed similar to Dan Brown's, as both authors shine in the same genre. Looking at the long list of books by Steve Berry, I chose to start with the Jefferson Key, that seemed really conspiracy like. 

The story.

Similar to Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot, Sir Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Dan Brown's Robert Langdon, Steve Berry has a main character that appears in most of his works. The Jefferson Key is no exception.

We then follow Cotton Malone who goes in the United States to help a friend. During his trip, he discovers that the death of four assassinated presidents, Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley and Kennedy, might not be unrelated... that, and many others things, leads to a secret society called the Commonwealth, created during the revolution. At the heart of all this mysterious enigma are two missing pages from the Senate's report which are searched by many people for different reasons.

My thoughts.

I expected this to be like a quest, with a tiny clue leading to another one, which leads again to another one and at the end, the big reveal. So tiny secrets thrown as crumbs to keep you curious but still full of appetite before finding the truth behind, given on a golden plate. However, it did not turned out like that. The Jefferson Key, despite having an important secret with a lot at stake, is more filled with strategies, backstabbing, mind games and action.

At first, I was disappointed at the lack of enigma. Being used to Dan Brown, I wanted a thrilling journey, displayed like a game with pursuers. But that disappointment quickly disappeared.

The action is well written. Each chapter is separated with different paragraphs that follow different characters. It feels like a movie, or a TV show, where you follow each protagonist of the story, which allows you to know what happens at what time with who, giving you a good insight on the events. You get to understand better what is at stake, what everyone is thinking and how did that lead them to certain decisions. 

The writing saved the story and the lack of thinking. There is one action scene that felt incredible, as you would get character A going upstairs and breaking a glass, for example, and then you have character B who hears the footsteps and go hiding, then character C hears the glass breaking and comes out to fight... It really felt like an action movie with the camera following the action instead of the main character. It was a pleasant surprise and it helped turning the pages.

The big reveal and the ending. Well... It was "meh". Not incredible, not bad, just average. Now that some time passed since I finished the book, I understand better why the big reveal was done so late and why that ending instead of another one. The two missing pages, that we learn about since the beginning of the story, are just so important in a political point of view, that you cannot risk to reveal them so soon. It has to be at the very end. I mean, the pages are important enough to have... MANY people involved in the search. It just makes sense, I guess? I understood better why the author made that choice and I could not blame him for that. 

Conclusion.

I don't have many things to say, to be honest. I enjoyed reading the Jefferson Key and I do not feel like I wasted my time. 

I do not recommend it, except for that one action scene that I still think of to this day. 

I think I might not have chosen the best book to discover Steve Berry's works... So I guess, thanks me of the past for buying two more? I have the Romanov Prophecy (published in 2004) and another Cotton Malone adventure, the Malta Exchange (published in 2019).

I will read those two when I feel like it (and it might change this review).

Otherwise, nice read, but not remarkable.