Rating: 
Summary: Okay, but no more
Review: Mr. Pearl knows how to plot. Unfortunately his writing isn't up to the same standard. His prose style is stodgy and the characters are flat. Still, I look forward to his next effort which ought to bring some improvement.
Rating: 
Summary: To Hell and Back in olde New England
Review: " Have you ever told someone or been told to "Go to Hell?"Well!
700 years ago in Florence, Italy a middle aged(that's important)
man named Dante Alighieri wrote a poem about and drew a map of
Hell. It is called the Divine Comedy and is in three parts: Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. Matthew Pearl has taken certain
sins and punishments from the Inferno and has set a murder mystery in post civil war Boston. The Dante Club consists of the poets Longfellow and Lowell,the physician and author Holmes and sveral others. These folks meet often usually at Longfellow's house and decipher a series of hideous killings that only a person familiar with the Inferno could perpetrate.This reviewer studied Dante in college and i have lived my life with his description of the heavenly and, not so heavenly, spheres in the back of my mind. However one need not be a scholar to enjoy The Dante Club. Wait 'til you find out who the real perp turns out to be!Honestly, I havent enjoyed a book so much since I played
CLUE as a teenager!I recommend this novel,ThE DANTE CLUB to everyone who likes surprises!
Rating: 
Summary: What a Superb Debut Novel from Matthew Pearl!
Review: In 1867 Dante Alighieri's THE DIVINE COMEDY was almost banned in Boston. History tells us that Harvard College's academic community worked feverishly to prevent the publication of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's first American translation of THE DIVINE COMEDY. The powerful Brahmins considered the book to be a blasphemous and insidiously dangerous work --- a scandalous tome that would corrupt readers and lead them into perdition. Matthew Pearl uses this historical event as his canvas to flesh out his tale of murder, madness, fear and friendship in his first novel, THE DANTE CLUB. Juxtaposed against this heady, contentious background, Pearl delivers an amazing tale about the real life Dante Club, whose respected members were Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the poets Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes (father of the great jurist) and James Russell Lowell, historian George W. Greene and their publisher, J. T. Fields. The mission of the club was to help Longfellow, their friend and colleague, bring THE DIVINE COMEDY into America's growing literary canon. Their weekly meetings also served as a forum for them to discuss their own work, each other's work and worldly issues. But the lofty pursuits of these men are interrupted when a spate of grisly murders plague Boston --- and so the fiction begins! "What kind of madman would be recreating the gruesome deaths depicted in Alighieri's INFERNO?" That is the question that haunts the members of the Dante Club, for it is they who recognize the demonic twist in the murderer's modus operandi. They are quite shocked when they realize the murderer is acting out the foul "punishments" Dante wrote about. "How could this be?" they ask each other, because as far as anyone knows, nobody in America has even seen the Italian tome. After long deliberation, they decide that it's in their best interest not to go to the police with their observations ... lest they be charged with the atrocious crimes. Thus, with good intentions, they set about to solve the murders themselves. Their efforts are laudable and Dr. Holmes takes charge while J. T. Fields remains grounded in common sense whenever things get out of hand. But, my fellow bibliophiles and devoted readers, let's backtrack for a moment to examine the physicality of the book. First, the jacket is splattered with blood spots. Second, when you open to the title page you will find a horrific depiction of Hell that will both repel and draw you in. And, when you finally turn the page to begin your journey, you are greeted by "CAUTION TO THE READER ... A PREFACE ..." and at the end of his comments he closes with this sentence, "If you continue [to read this book] remember first that words can bleed." Chilling perhaps, but clever devices nonetheless; they serve to set the mood of this imaginative and wholly enjoyable novel. Mr. Pearl is an award winning Dante scholar who, at the age of twenty-six, has delivered a witty, ironic, sardonic, interesting, entertaining, gruesome, ingenious, well plotted and unconventional novel in the spirit of E. L. Doctorow's best "fiction." His characters, both real and fictional, make for a community of folks who are unforgettable in their respective roles. Now and then, a new writer appears on the horizon with a smash hit, only to disappear when the sun goes down. Matthew Pearl is not a "one novel wonder." He has the ability and intellectual dexterity to bring forth the kinds of large fictions nineteenth century readers were accustomed to --- books in which an individual could immerse her/himself and come away stimulated with new ideas. And so it is with THE DANTE CLUB, a very important book. It works on many levels and has the sparkle needed to inspire readers to recommend it to their friends. Maybe it will even prompt you to explore INFERNO. And, if not, that's okay too. Fortunately, you don't have to be a Dante scholar to realize that this work will be discussed and analyzed and read with relish. Enjoy THE DANTE CLUB! --- Reviewed by Barbara Lipkien Gershenbaum
Rating: 
Summary: an amateurish effort
Review: Despite all the the hype and some of the reviews posted in amazon.com by what sounds like friends, family and publicists, The Dante Club is probably the weakest and least acomplished product published in the long shadow cast by Caleb Carr's The Alienist. In the past few years the historical thriller genre has been revived, and some of the titles it has spawned have been quite interesting. While sometimes formulaic, if the writer is good, the conventions become part of the game. Sadly, none of this applies here. The blatant high-concept strategy behind THE DANTE CLUB falls flat not because it's been done to death, but because it is not done well at all. The storyline is weak and uninvolving, the characters are dead on the page and the writing feels amateurish at best. Ultimately the novel turns into a tedious exercise in copycating a popular genre without the minimun literary requirements to enter the game. I wanted to like this book badly, yet after a few pages of clumsy plotting and less than mediocre prose, I began to despair. By the end I felt that Mr.Pearl, while surely an enthusiastic dante scholar with interesting ideas about his subject and the period where the novel is set, is certainly no novelist and that his publishers, perhaps tempted by the easy promise of a high concept strategy, have pushed him into the limelight before he can even lift a pen in the fiction field. It is a shame, because I suspect that not even all the hype in the world will make almost anybody who reads THE DANTE CLUB pick up Mr.Pearl next book, if it is ever published. Specially not readers used to competently written mysteries and thrillers. All in all, THE DANTE CLUB reveals an even more disturbing trend than the mere churning of sub-alienist clones: the cynical manufacturing of these young, handsome and clean-cut twentysomething "geniuses" harvested from writing seminars or fancy college clubs with high-concept first "novels" that are increasingly becoming cannon fodder for an industry desperately seeking success. THE DANTE CLUB, alas, is an embarrasing failure.
Rating:
Summary: O Ye Who Enter - get ready for a wonderful novel
Review: The city of Boston is shocked and its police force stumped by the murder of two prominent citizens in 1865. Through forensic analysis and knowledge he shares with Henry Wadwsorth Longfellow and James Russell Lowell, two of the few Americans who have read Dante, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes realizes the victims died in the macabre manner of sinners in "Inferno". Incredibly, Matthew Pearl has crafted a novel that brings Dante to life along with three men who today are portraits hung on Harvard's walls and names on its buildings. In 1865 Holmes, Longfellow and Lowell were prominent members of the Harvard community at odds with Augustus Manning, the omnipotent head of the Harvard Corporation. As Pearl launches the three scholars on a mission to solve the bizarre chain of murders, their conversations portray a formality appropriate to the times and their stature, yet their manner and actions are more believable than what you'll read in a lot of modern crime fiction. Pearl also uses his fiction to provide a quick primer on Dante's life and works. You might want to read his introduction to Longfellow's translation of "Inferno" (it's in the excerpt that appears on Amazon.com) to discover how Longfellow became preoccupied with Dante in the early 1860s. There really was a Dante Club, a group of friends who gathered at Longfellow's house most Wednesdays to read and critique a canto or two. On top of this historical and literary backdrop, Pearl builds an intriguing plot that takes the scholars and his readers through all strata of post Civil War Boston and Cambridge. The end result is an exceptionally well-crafted mystery accompanied by an interesting peek into the lives of Dante, Longfellow and the academic elite of the late 19th century - an ambitious first novel that lives up to its promise.
Rating:
Summary: Poetry+ History+Mystery =An intelligent & exciting thriller!
Review: I know that I was required to read Dante's "Divine Comedy" as a college freshman, but, 16 years later, this novel has made me interested in pursuing Dante's masterpiece with a whole new outlook. ...Because, as the title suggests, this book is about the the historical collaboration of such great poets as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell and Oliver Wendell Holmes, who created an American translation of Dante's work. This novel, however, went beyond this basic premise when Matthew Pearl transformed this into a thriller/mystery in which Dante's Inferno is used as a vehicle for several brutal murders. I enjoyed this on so many levels: 1. The mystery itself was suspenseful and skillfully written;
2. The social commentary was thought-provoking, especially the issue of censorship, freedom of press, academic freedom, etc. This was touched upon in the discussion of how the Harvard Corporation attempted to stop the American translation of Dante;
3. The historical accounts of mid-19th-century Boston as well as the realistic descriptions of Civil War battlefields;
4.The discussions of Dante's "Divine Comedy" as well as the poetry of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell and Oliver Wendell Holmes. So, this novel served the multiple purpose of awakening me to the poetic genius of Dante, Longfellow, Lowell and Holmes while entertaining me with a suspenseful, well-written thriller! A great first novel by this young author!
Rating:
Summary: Join the Club!
Review: If you crave a novel that is reminiscent of all the wonderful old American classics, then look no more!This book is written in a style the likes of which we have not seen in American literature for decades! As the words flow effortlessly, the reader is treated to endless pages that are poetic and quotable. If you love and appreciate beautifully written old world American style, you will want to read and re-read this book! The Apocrypha by John A. De Vito is also something you should try. A cult classic in the making, I'd say.
Rating: 
Summary: Sorry, Dante....
Review: The author may be a Dante scholar but he is not yet a secure novelist. The Dante twist is a clever, entertaining plot device but the characters are dreadfully flat. The author supplies clues that are helpful in identifying the characters but these clues become annoying in a very short time: if facial hair is mentioned, it's Lowell; if a recalcitrant son is nearby, it's Holmes; if it's Annie Allegra asking for help with homework, it's Longfellow. I won't go into the maggots and blowflies....
Rating:
Summary: A Winner
Review: This is a remarkable book. Other reviews have repeated the story so it is not worth going into the details. The mystery portion of this historical thriller, is well paced and continues to unravel.
The wonderful part of the book is the character development. I especially enjoyed HOlmes, Longfellow and Lowell. We began to understand them as the extraordinary people they were as they dealt with the crisis of the murders in Boston. Also I particularly enjoyed the relationship between Oliver Wendell Holmes and his son. At times coincidence was stretched somewhat, but that is normal for a good mystery. Even the minor characters were fascinating.
Lastly the historical color added to overall impression. There were touching scenes of post Civil War Boston. All in all a wonderful effort. I can not wait for Mr. Pearl's next effort.
Rating:
Summary: High Concept Book of Ideas
Review: What is thee best way to fend off the beasts of torpid thought and boorish monsters of the narrow mind? Hit them with a Dante club. That is the metaphor which carries this book from its first page (page one) to the startling conclusion (page 372), and it is good. In fact, the concomitant plot is nowhere as exciting as that metaphor. Walk softly and carry a big Dante club. In the end, is it really all about the money?
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