Dan Brown – best selling author with over 200 million copies of his books swapping hands – released his latest novel, Inferno recently. He’s opened up recently to NPR about being an author and his new book, expected to sell like the proverbial hotcakes, but better, like really hot, sweet cakes, that you can read, and keep.

"In any novel, you would hope that the hero has someone to push back against ... I find the most interesting villains [are] those who do the right things for the wrong reasons, or the wrong things for the right reasons — either one is interesting,” he explains. “I love the gray area between right and wrong. Here is somebody who says we have an enormous population problem on this planet and everybody's turning a blind eye, and there are no simple solutions, but there is a solution. And while it's terrifying, maybe there's a silver lining to it. Maybe he's actually the good guy in all this." While the reviews for Inferno have been fairly strong, the critics suggest that this page-turner won’t be in line for any literary prizes. Brown, it seems, has forgone the sculpture of literature in exchange for a bestseller – combing the two is something of a lost art.

Dan BrownDan brown chats to some dudes somewhere - the 2010 Billboard Latino awards, to be exact

"You know, it's funny, I don't know where I would place myself in the literary landscape,” Brown admits. “I really just write the book that I would want to read. I put on the blinders, and I really — it is, for me, that simple. I'm somebody who likes codes and ciphers and chases and artwork and architecture, and all the things you find in a Robert Langdon thriller."