Uh oh. It’s always embarrassing to see an author run out of ideas, but it seems like this is exactly what has happened to Dan Brown. His latest novel ‘The Catholic Church Broke My Patio Window and Then Tried To Cover It Up’ is a 900 page novel about the Catholic Church breaking his patio window and then trying to cover it up. Yikes! Looks like Brown has lost the Midas touch that allowed him to produce classics like ‘Paul Bettany: Albino Assassin’ and ‘Art Only Exists To Hide Shit In It’. This is really going to cut into his bottom line.

The entire book is, as the title suggests, about him arguing with the Catholic Church because he knows they broke his patio window but they won’t admit it, as in this extract.

World famous author Dan Brown leaned out of his broken patio window and began to shout at the College of Cardinals who were standing nonchalantly on the other side of the street. ‘Hey!’ he shouted. ‘You broke my window.’
‘No we didn’t.’ said the Catholic Church.
‘Oh no? Then why are you hanging around just across the street?’
‘We were just looking at house prices.’ they said.
‘You don’t need to check house prices.’ said Dan Brown. ‘You’re the Catholic Church. You have billions of dollars. It’s not like you need to be careful with money.’
‘It’s that kind of thinking that made the Methodists poor.’ said the Catholic Church. ‘We have money because we have a financial plan. You should start one too. It will help you save money to fix the patio window that we didn’t break.’
Dan Brown growled like an angry Dan Brown wolf.

It’s a tale that gradually spirals out of control as Brown tries to call the police on the Catholic Church, only to find out that the police are in the pocket of the Catholic Church.

Sorry renowned author Dan Brown.’ said the cop. ‘We’re in the pocket of the Catholic Church, so we can’t help you.’

Eventually, this takes an awkward turn as the Catholic Church begins blaming other people for breaking his window.

‘It was the abortion lady who broke your window.’ said the Catholic Church. ‘She was bored of human abortions and decided to abort windows.’
‘That doesn’t sound true.’ replied Dan Brown.
‘Ok, then it was the gay agenda.’
‘It wasn’t the gay agenda.’ replied Dan Brown. ‘Today is Judy Garland’s birthday and they are sworn to non-violence on that day.’
‘Ok, then it was the little Greek boy.’
Dan Brown smiled triumphantly. ‘It couldn’t have been a little Greek boy because this is totally Caucasian neighborhood!’
The Catholic Church looked awkward.
‘Oh, it’s not a racist thing!’ Dan Brown insisted. ‘It’s just non-white people don’t want to move here!’
‘Uh huh.’ said the Catholic Church.
‘No, don’t say uh huh.’ Dan Brown pleaded. ‘No, please, you can’t think I’m racist. That’s not what this is about. I have non-white friends. It’s just this area is too affluent, and non-white people can’t afford it.’
The Catholic Church gasped.
‘No! Don’t gasp!’ shouted Dan Brown. ‘Wait here. I’m going to call my black friend and you can talk to him on the phone.’
When Dan Brown was gone, one Cardinal turned to another. ‘I thought Greeks were Caucasian.’ he said.

I’m not really sure why Dan Brown included the idea that he might be racist, and then spent the next three hundred pages trying to convince the Catholic Church that he wasn’t, but the book eventually gets back to him screaming at the Catholic Church for breaking his patio window.

‘I paid $50000 for that patio window.’ Dan Brown shouted. ‘Are you going to reimburse me?’
‘You paid $50000 for a patio window?’ asked the Catholic Church. ‘That is really overpriced.’
‘Wait, it is?’ asked Dan Brown. ‘Dammit. I knew that Shifty Bill the patio window salesman was too good to be true. Wait here. I’m going to shout at Shifty Bill on the phone.’

The novel escalates as Shifty Bill turns out to be part of the Catholic Church, and Dan Brown suspects that the Catholic Church plotted to do this to bankrupt him so as he wouldn’t write anymore books where he accuses them of trying to kill Jesus. And he’s right! The Catholic Church admits to it, and then the book ends.

‘Yes, ok, we did break your patio window.’ said the Catholic Church. ‘We’ll take the money out of our fund to help survivors of the Syrian Civil War to pay you back.’
‘That’s all I ever wanted.’ said Dan Brown, winking at the camera.

How embarrassing! Let’s hope Dan Brown can get over this slump and get back to producing his normal work of a man with hair being chased by secret people. He can’t deal with another disaster like this book, which critics are calling ‘easily better than his other work’.

Good luck to you Dan Brown. I hope you get your mojo back.