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Dance of Death

 Dance of Death
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TVTItem
 Dance of Death
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Dance of Death
 Dance of Death
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DanceOfDeath
 Dance of Death
comment
Dance of Death is a novel by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child first published in 2005. It is part of their informal Agent Pendergast series and the second novel in the Diogenes trilogy. This book also marked the 10th Anniversary of Pendergast's first appearance in The Relic, and as such, featured the return appearances of several characters from past books, including a few that hadn't yet appeared in any Pendergast-related novels from the greater "Preston-Child-verse" such as Eli Glinn from The Ice Limit.Aloysius and Diogenes Pendergast have been at odds since they were children. Aloysius was a quiet, brilliant child, while Diogenes was brewing something dark inside of him. Now, Diogenes is planning his "perfect" crime with a simple dare to his brother — "stop me if you can."
 Dance of Death
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2024-01-24T07:00:04Z
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2024-01-24T07:00:04Z
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Dropped link to BreakHerHeartToSaveHer: Not a Feature - UNKNOWN
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Dropped link to TheIceLimit: Not a Feature - ITEM
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BreakHerHeartToSaveHer
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DBTropes
 Dance of Death / int_105f4bd9
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Villain: Exit, Stage Left
 Dance of Death / int_105f4bd9
comment
Villain: Exit, Stage Left: Diogenes slips away in the tunnels.
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 Dance of Death / int_1206d299
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Can't Kill You, Still Need You
 Dance of Death / int_1206d299
comment
Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Pendergast realizes that Diogenes will not kill him at The Iron Clock, he needs him alive to enact his revenge.
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 Dance of Death / int_131e6871
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Crazy Sane
 Dance of Death / int_131e6871
comment
Crazy Sane: Diogenes muses at one point that The Event let him see the true nature of the world, and his madness was the only reasonable response.
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Dance of Death / int_131e6871
 Dance of Death / int_19d1c1ae
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Always Someone Better
 Dance of Death / int_19d1c1ae
comment
Always Someone Better: Diogenes is almost always one step ahead of Pendergast.
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 Dance of Death / int_1b65dfad
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The Cameo
 Dance of Death / int_1b65dfad
comment
The Cameo: Corrie makes a brief appearance during one chapter where one of Pendergast's associates helps put her in hiding in case Diogenes attempts to target her. Also Mime, who activates all his security systems when Pendergast warns him about Diogenes.
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 Dance of Death / int_1cd602ef
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Calling Card
 Dance of Death / int_1cd602ef
comment
Calling Card: In his taunts to Pendergast, Diogenes uses Tarot cards to name the targets.
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Dance of Death / int_1cd602ef
 Dance of Death / int_241ca0d8
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Back for the Dead
 Dance of Death / int_241ca0d8
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Back for the Dead: Margo is murdered a few chapters after her reintroduction, though it's ultimately subverted as Pendergast managed to save her and fake her death until the novel's end.
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Mythology Gag
 Dance of Death / int_26ac510e
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Mythology Gag: D'Agosta notices a book in Pendergast's apartment titled Ice Limit III: Return to Cape Horn, a joke on the authors' promise to deliver a sequel to The Ice Limit.
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Limited Wardrobe
 Dance of Death / int_2a7e7af1
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Limited Wardrobe: Pendergast has three dozen identical suits made out of the same antique bolt of fabric. The only times he's not wearing one of them is when he's in disguise.
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 Dance of Death / int_35ae6a23
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Lethal Chef
 Dance of Death / int_35ae6a23
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Lethal Chef: D'Agosta makes a holy mess of Laura's kitchen as he mentally laments that men are supposed to be the best chefs.
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 Dance of Death / int_370aad9
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Split Personality
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Split Personality: The workup on Pendergast Hayward has done pins him as a psychopath with Dissociative Identity Disorder, and leads her to believe that Diogenes is a figment of his imaginations and he himself is the killer.
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Grave Clouds
 Dance of Death / int_3c85bc3e
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Grave Clouds: Margo is buried in the dead of winter. Nora notes that it's so cold she thinks the tears might freeze on her face.
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 Dance of Death / int_42bc6d2b
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Hostage for MacGuffin
 Dance of Death / int_42bc6d2b
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Hostage for MacGuffin: Pendergast sets up a trade with Diogenes Viola for the real Lucifer's Heart.
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 Dance of Death / int_440d1d0b
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Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!
 Dance of Death / int_440d1d0b
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Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Despite all of Hayward's begging, D'Agosta throws away his career and possibly his freedom to help Pendergast.
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Jerk with a Heart of Gold
 Dance of Death / int_4781adbb
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Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Margo describes Smithback this way.
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Leaning on the Fourth Wall
 Dance of Death / int_4a3e547f
comment
Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Turns out Smithback has published novels based off the adventures he took part in (The Relic, Reliquary, and Thunderhead). When Margo and Nora meet for the first time he comments on his "main characters meeting for the first time" and Nora mentions that he's improved a lot as a writer since his first book.
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Motive Rant
 Dance of Death / int_4d044580
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Motive Rant: Diogenes likes gloating about his master plan as he enacts it's final stages.
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Chekhov's Exhibit
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comment
Chekhov's Exhibit: Several mentions are made of the Diamond Hall at the museum in the side plot, but it is played as secondary to the Sacred Images exhibition that is being set up. The Diamond Hall turns out to be Diogenes's real target and he cleans it out while Pendergast is trying to hunt down his next named murder victim.
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 Dance of Death / int_59eee458
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More Hypnotizable Than He Thinks
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More Hypnotizable Than He Thinks: Subverted. Glinn brings in the best hypnotist in the world to regress Pendergast and find out what happened to make Diogenes crazy and hate him. When the hypnotist pulls out all the stops, it seems as if Pendergast has finally submitted to the regression. He sits up, remarks that the whole thing is a waste of time and isn't working and walks out.
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 Dance of Death / int_5a3b8032
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The Un-Reveal
 Dance of Death / int_5a3b8032
comment
The Unreveal: "The Event" that made Diogenes hate Pendergast so thoroughly and drove him to evil and insanity is built up through the whole novel. We don't get to find out what happened before the story is over. Since it's not important to the story progression, we aren't even given a hint of how Eli Glinn survived his debut appearance.
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Bavarian Fire Drill
 Dance of Death / int_62fd5552
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Bavarian Fire Drill: Pendergast blows through security at the airport by employing these tactics, flattering the guards and convincing them that he already has his clearance to see the security tapes. The best part comes when he promises a surly technician a ten thousand dollar reward for pulling up the footage they need as fast as humanly possible. When he asks where he can collect his reward, Pendergast simply says "Ten thousand dollars? Just for doing your job? A ridiculous idea." The other techs get a kick out of it.
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Heroic Sacrifice
 Dance of Death / int_6439de78
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Heroic Sacrifice: Pendergast outwits Diogenes by doing the one thing Diogenes wouldn't have though of doing himself - he calls in the police, knowing he'll be caught.
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Belligerent Sexual Tension
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Belligerent Sexual Tension: Nora recounts how she first met and fell in love with Smithback in Thunderhead and how she thought he was "the biggest jerk I'd ever met."
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 Dance of Death / int_927b2f11
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The Bus Came Back
 Dance of Death / int_927b2f11
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The Bus Came Back: Margo and Smithback return for the first time since Reliquary and The Cabinet of Curiosities.
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 Dance of Death / int_92c04b83
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Stolen MacGuffin Reveal
 Dance of Death / int_92c04b83
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Stolen MacGuffin Reveal: Diogenes loses it when he realizes he stole a fake Lucifer's Heart. The real diamond was never on display, locked safely in the insurance company's vault.
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 Dance of Death / int_9b73b497
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The Only One Allowed to Defeat You
 Dance of Death / int_9b73b497
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The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Diogenes rescues Pendergast from Foscoe before the story starts. Not because he cared about his brother, but because destroying him was his job.
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Bored with Insanity
 Dance of Death / int_9f0a1d18
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Bored with Insanity: Diogenes says that he let himself slip into complete madness for sometime before he learned to come back from it into a manageable insanity.
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 Dance of Death / int_a08199ec
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The Dog Was the Mastermind
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comment
The Dog Was the Mastermind: Hugo Menzies, the head of the Anthropology department and minor supporting character in Nora's side story, was actually Diogenes and pulled off the heist under everyone's noses.
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 Dance of Death / int_a0db7803
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It's Personal
 Dance of Death / int_a0db7803
comment
It's Personal: Diogenes is out to destroy his brother on every level he can think of. He sets out to murder anyone he cares about and pin it on him and pull off the biggest crime of his life while Pendergast is completely distracted and unable to stop him. In a more diminished sense, Agent Coffey is downright gleeful that Pendergast is now an outlaw and he can exact revenge for his embarrassment at his hands in The Relic. He even orders his agents to shoot him on sight.
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 Dance of Death / int_a4878b81
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It's Not You, It's My Enemies
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It's Not You, It's My Enemies: Pendergast tells Viola she'll never be safe with him as long as Diogenes is loose.
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Funny Schizophrenia
 Dance of Death / int_a9e84230
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Funny Schizophrenia: Throckmorton's outburst is disturbing to Smithback, but it's comes off as quite funny to the reader.
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 Dance of Death / int_afe98316
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Talkative Loon
 Dance of Death / int_afe98316
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Talkative Loon: Smithback thinks Throckmorton is just as sane as he is, until he suddenly veers from their completely normal conversation to shouting random quotes from Shakespeare and then insists that he has to leave to do the Lord's bidding.
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AxeCrazy
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Axe-Crazy: D'Agosta is warned not to get too close to Aunt Cornelia — even though she's tied to a wheelchair she's managed to put two orderlies in the hospital in the last year.
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Revenge by Proxy
 Dance of Death / int_b77eb3b2
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Revenge by Proxy: Diogenes targets Pendergast's friends and colleagues.
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I Will Wait for You
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I Will Wait for You: When Pendergast tells her he can never be with her as long as his brother is out there, Viola tells him she'll expect to see him on her island the day he is free.
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Self-Deprecation
 Dance of Death / int_c9597a03
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Self-Deprecation: When Smithback tries to convince the hospital director that he's sane so he can leave, one of the things he tries to drop as proof is the fact that he's a published author and that anyone can simply look at the back cover of one of his books for a picture. Said books all share titles with Preston and Child's other works. The Doctor doesn't even try to humor him, citing that such fiction is unavailable at the hospital library and condescendingly states that it appeals to the Lowest Common Denominator anyway.
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The Chessmaster
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The Chessmaster: Diogenes. Some of his moves have been plotted out for over a decade, including the creation of Hugo Menzies.
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You're Insane!
 Dance of Death / int_d7ecbd57
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You're Insane!: When Diogenes delivers his Motive Rant to her, Viola can only say "My God," conveying her realization that he is completely insane.
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Go Among Mad People
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Go Among Mad People: When Smithback is named as a target, Pendergast hides him in an asylum for the wealthy who need "rest."
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Last-Name Basis
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Last-Name Basis: Pendergast doesn't like being called Aloysius. Making it a particularly touching moment when D'Agosta addresses him by his first name when saying that he won't abandon him to save himself.
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Unexplained Recovery
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Unexplained Recovery: When we last saw Eli Glinn, he was at ground zero of an asteroid that reacts violently to contact with salt water suddenly getting exposed to it as the ship it's on goes down in freezing, stormy seas just off Antarctica and is somehow alive and only paraplegic after all of that. Plot Armor doesn't even begin to justify it.
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Not My Driver
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Not My Driver: Pendergast abducts Smithback by posing as a cabbie.
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Evil Cannot Comprehend Good
 Dance of Death / int_f8e010ce
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Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Diogenes orchestrates his complex plot both to get revenge on his brother and to manipulate him into stealing a set of priceless diamonds from the museum. Aloysius complies with his brother's demands, then deliberately draws the FBI and the NYPD to the drop point, explaining that Diogenes thought of almost every possible contingency... but the notion that Aloysius would willingly sacrifice his own freedom to thwart Diogenes's plan would never have crossed the latter's mind.
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Faking the Dead
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comment
Faking the Dead: Pendergast saves Margo by quietly transferring her to a hospital out of the city and fudging paperwork at the morgue to identify a random body as her. Diogenes thinks she succumbed to her injuries, and she is instantly safe from further attack.
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Master of Disguise
 Dance of Death / int_fd7267dd
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Master of Disguise: Both Pendergast brothers. Diogenes takes it to diabolical lengths, creating half a dozen people and living as them, some for decades.
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 Dance of Death / int_name
itemName
Dance of Death

The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

 Dance of Death
hasFeature
Break His Heart to Save Him / int_26daf637
 Dance of Death
hasFeature
Disney Death / int_26daf637
 TheDangerousDaysOfDanielX
seeAlso
Dance of Death