This is a work of fiction. The copyright page contains as do all of Brown’s novels contains this disclaimer that is largely ignored by readers.

 

Page 463 is an extension of this copyright page. This page contains the illustration credits for the novel.

IN MEMORY OF MY MOTHER Brown’s other novels in the Robert Langdon series are dedicated to his wife, Blythe.   His mother passed away in May of 2017  as the novel was close to release.

We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve  planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.  — Joseph Campbell  

Campbell (1904-1987) was a Professor at Sarah Lawrence College and a noted scholar and writer on topics of myth and religion. His major work was The Hero with a Thousand Faces. The quote is found on the Facebook page of the Joseph  Campbell Foundation. It is attributed to Campbell by Diane K. Osbon, Reflections on the Art of Living: A Joseph Campbell Companion, Selected and edited by, Quote Page 8 and 18, New York, New York: HarperCollins,1991. The quote itself is not found in any of Campbell’s works. Others have claimed that the quote originates with the novelist E. M. Forster. The use of a quotation to open his novel is not new for Brown. The Lost Symbol opens with a quote without attribution but from The Secret Teachings of All Ages by Manly P. Hall and Inferno opens with quote attributed to Dante, but actually a paraphrase by John Kennedy.