Bestselling author of "The Da Vinci Code" fame Dan Brown will be on his maiden visit to India next month during which he will deliver this year's Penguin Lecture.
The publishing house said its annual lecture featuring the author of novels like "Angels & Demons", "The Lost Symbol", "Inferno", "Digital Fortress" and "Deception Point" will be held on November 10.
"The Penguin Annual Lecture has featured luminaries, and we are incredibly excited that this year's lecture will be delivered by Dan Brown. One of the most popular and influential novelists in the world. We are eagerly looking forward to a fascinating and magnificent event - one not to be missed," says Hemali Sodhi of Penguin India Books.
The lecture series has been featuring some of the world's most respected leaders, thinkers and writers, and builds on Penguin India's commitment to bring the finest minds in the world in direct contact with Indian audiences, she said.
The seven previous lectures have been delivered by journalist and writer Thomas Friedman in 2007, diplomat and writer Chris Patten in 2008, Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen in 2009, historian Ramachandra Guha in 2010, Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama in 2011, former President A P J Abdul Kalam in 2012 and megastar Amitabh Bachchan last year.
Brown will also be speaking at the 33rd edition of the Sharjah International Book Fair next month.
In 2005, Brown was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World by TIME Magazine, whose editors credited him with "keeping the publishing industry afloat; renewed interest in Leonardo da Vinci and early Christian history; spiking tourism to Paris and Rome; a growing membership in secret societies; the ire of Cardinals in Rome; eight books denying the claims of the novel and seven guides to read along with it; a flood of historical thrillers; and a major motion picture franchise."
The son of a mathematics teacher and a church organist, Brown was raised on a prep school campus where he developed a fascination with the paradoxical interplay between science and religion. These themes eventually formed the backdrop for his books. He is a graduate of Amherst College and Phillips Exeter Academy, where he later returned to teach English before focusing his attention full time to writing.
Brown is currently at work on a new book as well as the Columbia Pictures film version of his most recent novel, "The Lost Symbol".
