The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco: **1/2

This was a good read, an enjoyable story. It's more of a standard detective story than I thought it would be, given Eco's stature as a semiological theorist and thinker. In fact, I don't think I've read any other fiction by authors I've read for my graduate music theory courses. I'm not exactly sure what I thought this book was, but I definitely expected it to be much more conceptual than this. That said, Eco could write good detective novels. Of course, this one is pretty long - over 800 pages - so the mystery has plenty of time to develop. Eco does use semiology in the story. The detective work is all tied to the idea of signs and symbols and such, but it almost seemed too simple considering the other ideas I've read by him. On the whole, though, I enjoyed the reading process and liked the book's conclusions, but I won't remember the story extensively for too much of my life.
(spring 2001)

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