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Summary: Ever heard of a plot?
Review: After reading Snow Crash and loving it, I was very interested in reading this book. What a waste of time. It wasn't until the last few pages that a recognizable plot developed. The book kept skipping around between time periods, which became rather annoying. Just leave this on on the shelf!
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Summary: Quite possibly the most incredible novel I've ever read
Review: My reaction to it is similar to my reaction to Stoppard's incredible "Arcadia." This is a book that shows how moving, exciting, and emotional the "dry" subjects that intellectuals and engineers deal with every day can be. If you are the kind of person who might find the illustrated mathematical description of a man's sex life and its effect on his productivity amusing, or are the kind of person who has thought about such things in such terms yourself, you would do yourslef a great disservice by failing to read this book.Of course its appeal is not limited to computer scientists or mathematicians. Anyone with interests from history, to economics, to math, to academia, to the far east, to mythology, to religion, to fantasy role playing will find something to resonate with in this book. On finishing it I was struck with a sadness that I knew it would be a very long time before I found another book nearly as remarkable.
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Summary: Find a nice chair, or weekend to read this book in!
Review: I recently finished reading Cryptonomicon. I can't say when I have enjoyed a book as much as this. It has been a VERY long time. The story flowed well, and the mix of present day and WWII settings was very artfully done. This will probably end up being the most enjoyable book I will have read in the past few years. I now know that the rain and cloudy skies of the Pacific Northwest have been put to good use, driving authors such as Neal to produce good literature that I can eventually discover and read, then write obscure reviews via email on them which may be read, by a handfull of the intelligent few on the planet who still consider reading a pleasure! Disappointing to me, as I have just finished it. Good thing for me I haven't read Snow Crash or his other works yet!
**UPDATE ** it's been a year and I still think highly of this book!
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Summary: Not just a genre writer anymore
Review: OK, read "Snow Crash" or "Diamond Age" if you're into that sort of thing. Stephenson did a pretty good job of writing two half-books, but in each case wandered off into the kind of goofy arcane mysticism that was part of the formula in a lot of '70s/'80s science fiction. "Cryptonomicon" is another book entirely. I don't know what you read for, but in fiction I look for complex plot, serious treatment of interesting technology, in-depth characterization of unusual people the author makes me care about, and a joy of craft. Stephenson knows cryptography (he's written a non-fiction book on it) and computing (another book, on operating systems); part of what this book is about is the early-'40s roots and the right-now flowering of both disciplines. He buries those four strands in parallel narratives of a grandfather and grandson who are both of a type that I recognize: seriously smart people who (when they think of it) have to work to be aware of the social life that surrounds them. One of Stephenson's achievements is that he gets into the heads of both of these people, giving the reader a sympathetic and recognizably geek-eye view of the world. Oh, yeah, there's also a sympathetic portrayal of a Marine sergeant who's a bit of a geek, himself: his attitude towards the social arts is best summed up on one of his lines: "Sir, no sir! But I do detect a strong odor of politics in the room now, sir!" As to joy of craft, the guy's writing is somewhere between Dave Barry and Hunter Thompson -- embedded in the book are long riffs that further the story or deepen the characterization but that could stand on their own as examples of pure creative "I'm doing this because I can" story-telling. The tale of Randy's wisdom teeth is a perfect example -- read from page 776 through to the kicker sentence at the bottom of page 779 and you'll get a new perspective on Randy (the grandson), oral surgeons, and Stephenson. Well worth the read.
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Summary: Did anyone finish this book?
Review: Oh my god... this book is SO boring! I love Stephenson's writing style, and his witty observations on the world. But I don't read stories for that. I read them for an interesting plot and characters. This book has characters, but no plot. Can anyone even say what the point is, apart from a few drab men wandering about breaking codes in WWII while in the future another sets up a company laying pipelines? Is that fun reading? Whoever finds that enjoyable really needs to get out more, I think. Either that or I'm just not wild and crazy enough for a book like this. I read 500 pages in hopes that a plot would develop and I would be rewarded at the end. Alas, I couldn't make it through and began reading a much better book (A Game of Thrones). Computer geek or not, you need a lot of free time and patience to finish this sleeper. If you don't have it, please don't bother with this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Good, but pay no attention to the Editorial Reviews.
Review: I read this novel before reading the review, and believe people may be misled by the editorial review. Pay no attention to it! Although this was a good book, especially for those familiar with Unix or basic cryptography (cypherpunks!) and overall nerds such as myself, it certainly does not warrant ranking with Pynchon or the Illuminatus trilogy! Comparison with classical novels (or near-classical) is a dangerous act, and rarely warrants the praise. This is a great example. Although far surpassing Stephenson's scifi/technical novels, this novel is by no means a classic or modern-day classic, but still worth the read.
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Summary: Highly engaging, multi-generational information warfare!
Review: This is an awsome read! Stephenson knows how to take a very complex and technical subject and keep it interesting enough for those with the background to understand, while making sure the non-techie can get into the story. This is a great information warfare book, and helps us modern day techies understand that there was tech before dgital. The story line on traffic analysis will make the anonymous reamiler users understand how old some of our techno problems really are! Stephenson helps the reader understand that the base problems stay the same, while the tools get better and faster. The story is well woven on the grand scale, sometimes missing on the details, always dry and ironic, and only preaches once or twice. The style of writing speaks volumes to the cube dwelling, male oriented, tech heads that make up the high probability buyer of this massive volume. A great read, well worth the effort to read, and a lot more entertaining than man pages!
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Summary: Not just for the techno-types
Review: I loved Cryptonomicon because it's well written. Despite being a seriously interesting story, full of fascinating details, it's also amusing. Some of my favorite bits were a description of a throne and of a character eating Cap'n Crunch cereal. The friends who recommended it to me, one a Physics professor and the other a math and computer person, told me that I might want to skip some of the pages of math, but I didn't.
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Summary: Not for the weak of heart, or brain. Prepare to think.
Review: If you found high school algebra dull and boring, you might have a little bit of work here. Stephensons passion for the history, past and now unfolding, of cryptology finds it's voice in cryptonomicon. His same writing style seen in the action packed adventure of Hero in Snowcrash, is present, but he explores alot of his own ideas on cryptology and it's effects on society, and maybe even being a voice of the age. He takes his time, and has been accused of "wasting" space in this novel, to profess his ideology on the subject. I love when critics and readers decide how and what someone should write about in their novel. The action and suspense is certainly present, but I would think one needs to let the man tell his story and take away some new knowledge, of the practical and abstract as it is offered here. Excellent book, on alot of levels.
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Summary: Mind Candy for Techno-Weenies
Review: This is great fun for the technologist and/or cryptologist. Both understand basic math. It switches between World War II and today, yet all ties together by the end of the book. It has anomalies, not the least of which is that a major character killed in World War II reappears very much alive some 50 years later with no explanation. That aside, the stories are individually and collectively interesting and frequently also amusing. Lots of little things are memorable, such as an unusual means of dividing up a bequest among a family of mathematicians. The cryptography is necessarily simplified, and several historical characters are to be taken with a grain of salt. That aside, it's a good book to curl up with when desiring a quiet evening.
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