Cryptonomicon

Rating:
Summary: Cryptonomicon--A Great Read!
Review: Stephenson has always been a brilliant writer; in Cryptonomicon he handles his most ambitious and serious work to date with aplomb. How do I start? I read Cryptonomicon while I was travelling through Japan and Southeast Asia, and Stephenson has definitely hit the nail on the head in describing the people, the landscapes, and the atmosphere. It would also be easy to write a review focusing on the depth of the technical details, the intricate weaving of history and the present, perhaps even the imposing size of the book itself.

However, every potential reader should know that this is a very humorous book. It is one of the funniest novels I've ever read--that rare book that doubles you over in the middle of the night laughing out loud (to the dismay of your partner/roommate/neighbor).

Books like these don't come by often, and I say with certainty that this book is worth a 5-star rating. After reading it, I immediately missed it--the heft of it, the breadth of it, and the familiarity of it (again after all, it is 900 pages!). I urge you to give it a try.

Rating:
Summary: Great Summer Fun
Review: This book fantastic, thats the short version. When I first read in the newspaper that Stephenson was writting a historical fiction but as the article revealed some of the guidlines of the plot I became very excitited. Nazi Gold, Data Havens, and World War II all in one, by the time I finished the article I regretted reading it at all because I knew that I would'nt be able to get if for amonth. It's a bit heafty, but well worth it. The most interesting aspect of this book was that if you dont have any previos background in World War II history it can be a little difficult to tell exactly where the fact and the history leaves off.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I have ever read
Review: I have read all of Neal Stephenson's books and this is by far his best.

Rating:
Summary: Fan-Freakin-Tastic
Review: Finally, a book that actually enters a new realm. I am so tired of the same plots being revampd over and over. Stephenson writes a book with clearly dilineated plots and characters and most of his techinical discourse should be readable, if not understood, by the non-technical. Speaking as a highly technical person myself, it was refereshing to read a story that was technically accurate. None of this psuedo-"I own a computer so that makes me technically literate" junk that many other writers use to pass for technical-literacy. Stephenson obviously either knows his stuff or found someone who does.

Aside from that, the book was a page turner. He did a greate job of keeping the two stories separate, but related, and I never got confused as to which plot was being described at any given time.

Definitely gonna check out his other stuff.

Rating:
Summary: Another overrated mess
Review: Another book with critical acclaim making a great deal of noise and signifying nothing. I'm a computer nerd myself and frankly by about 1/2 way through the book, I stopped caring about any of the characters. When you stop being impressed with Stephenson's wealth of knowledge, you're left feeling like you've been had. The ideas are old sci-fi mixed with every second rate espionage thriller you've seen in the movies over the past four years. I read through it, but frankly....the author tries too hard, and it's too long. The whole thing could have been done in 200 pages. And this is only the first part?! Please, spare us.

Rating:
Summary: Good, but confusing.
Review: If you haven't read any Neal Stephenson, this is not the book to start on. Go read Snow Crash, which is better (and a lot shorter).

As for Cryptonomicon...half fantastic novel, half math book. There were times when i though i'd accidentally picked up a textbook instead of a novel. It makes sense to try to explain the mechanics of essential parts of the story, but i think this book could have done without the descriptions of the various cryptographic methods. Some were done well, with explanatory sentences stuck in as we read about someone encrypting a message. But most seemed to be just wedged in to the story to make it more technical. Stephenson probably could have edited a good 500 pages out of this book and made it much more accessible. It's not that the mathmatical parts were too complex, they just weren't very interesting to me.

There were also a few things that just didn't make sense. One character dies, and later shows up again. It seems to be the same person (rather than another with the same name), and I didn't see anything that explained this apparent contradiction.

If you're a Stephenson fan, then this book is probably worth the time. However, if you're looking for a quick read, this isn't it (900+ pages).

Rating:
Summary: Great 3/4s of a book!
Review: This is such a long book that I'll keep this short: it is a great book for the first quarter, a good book by the time you hit the halfway point, an interesting book at three quarters, and a terrible dissappointment at the end.

Mr Stephenson should get a better editor, because at over 900 pages, this is no way to end a book.

Rating:
Summary: Easily Stephenson's Best
Review: ... This book is easily Stephenson's best. Based on previous works, many people assume it's going to be about SF-ish things, but this isn't. It's partly historical fiction, partly a glimpse into modern hacker culture, and partly a treatise on cryptography. The depths to which Stephenson explores this last part is astounding. He does a wonderful job of describing cryptography in terms a layperson could understand and, around it, he builds a story that's both engaging and entertaining. His characters come alive and are not mere placeholders that serve to move the plot along. Stephenson has really done his homework on this one and it shows. Anyone who has any interest in hacking, in World War II, in cryptography or in action-adventures would love this book. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: A Pinch of Pynchon
Review: Even though I think this book's reach exceeds its grasp, I still couldn't put it down and I give it four stars anyway. I've never been a rabid SF fan but I intend to check out Stephenson's earlier works and eagerly anticipate the projected "sequals" (if that's what they're intended to be.)

Now for the shortcomings.

This book has been described as a worthy successor to Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow (albeit more readable). Not quite. No one, not even Pynchon's subsequent works, can compete with that massive opus. It stands alone, but clearly Stephenson has been influenced by it, as well as Pynchon's first novel, V. Both author's have deftly replaced humanistic metaphors for scientific one--Stephenson draws numerous parallels between the efforts to conceal information in noise, and the consequent need to extract meaningful information from same, and the normal everyday quest for meaning in a seemingly random existence; Pynchon uses the arc of the rocket to illuminate the issues of free will and choice within a deterministic world succumbing to entropy. Both authors seem to view plot structure as simply a framework upon which to drape the topics that really concern them. Both authors (though Stephenson not so explicitly) are fascinated by Western civilization colliding with primitive tropical cultures. And one can even see a direct imitation in Stephenson's juxtaposing of two generations in different historical moments to tell essentially one story--this is, of course, the fundamental structure of V. And both authors leave you hanging. In Pynchon's case, this becomes his primary statement--quests are never complete, our search for meaning will never be satisfied empirically. Stephenson, one suspects, simply postpones resolutions for a future volume.

The difference is one of depth and degree. Stephenson has given us neither the scope of Pynchon's thematic vision, nor a story line that pulls us along like, say, an Ellmore Leonard, a Lawrence Block, even a Tom Clancy--writers who skate across a surface of action and dialogue, with little thought given to underlying themes. We want something more, and, I suspect, Stephenson does as well.

It's a fun book, the science elements are presented clearly and in a way that makes them meaningful and relevant, and you want very much to find out what's going to happen. My only point is, it's been done before. If you want to see how a master handles these themes, read Pynchon.

Rating:
Summary: 56
Review: I wasn't sure what to expect when I picked up this book. I guess I expected a book that's nearly a thousand pages long to be dense and ponderous, stilted by the author's desire to create an epic. It is an epic of sorts, but a modern epic; it reminded me of the film "Three Kings." It moves fast and has a strong sense of humor, especially in its interpretation of history. The chapter devoted to Douglas MacArthur is pure genius.

Each chapter revolves around one of three main characters. This jumping back and forth keeps the reader guessing and the story moving. And though there's a lot of humor, there's a lot of drama and action, too. The characters are fascinating, even the minor ones.

My only gripe is that towards the end (the last three hundred pages) the story speeds up, and generally has a rushed quality. Also, at the end, some story lines seem to come to nothing (I'd like to know more about the Enoch Root character). I hope this means it's part of a series.

In summary, check it out. It's a good book: funny, a little off-kilter. I loved it.