Dan Brown is no stranger to best seller lists, blockbuster movie adaptations and cultural publishing moments. For more than two decades, his work has defined the fast-paced thriller genre: puzzles that blend religion, conspiracy, history and mystery. Ever since The Da Vinci Code became a publishing landmark, each of his books has been greeted with growing anticipation — along with a fair share of criticism. Eight years after the publication of Origin (2017), The Secret of Secrets arrived as a test of whether Brown’s formula can command attention in a literary and publishing landscape transformed by #BookTok, celebrity book clubs, and shifting reader tastes. The city of Prague — along with its Gothic architecture, century-old legends and occult and mystical history — serves as a character in this story. (Shutterstock) 704pp, ₹1499; Penguin Randomhouse Angels and Demons (1999) introduced readers to the hero of all of Brown’s subsequent books — Robert Langdon. A professor of religious symbology at Harvard, he gets caught in unlikely events where his unique talent of decoding cryptic clues and his …