Rating: 
Summary: Not worth your money
Review: This book has the distinction of being the WORST computer
related novel I've ever read. The author's ignorance of
all 'net things, and of the subject-matter of hacking in particular, is amazing. His "technology" is just BOGUS
all the way through. Would you be interested is reading a historical novel set
in the Middle Ages, with characters running around with
machine guns and hand-grenades? Or a sci-fi novel with
spaceships powered by gasoline or coal? That's the kind of
technology info you get from this book. Not to mention the
good old stereotype of socially disfunctional computer
geek turned serial killer. The author and the editors are so apparently out to make a
quick buck on the public's interest in "hackers", it's not
even funny. It's mediocre and offensive.
Rating: 
Summary: You will never trust your own identity again.
Review: Jeffrey Deaver does a remarkable job of capturing what is surely becoming the biggest fear of the twenty first century - identity theft. In a labyrinth of computer technology, we are woven into a story where nothing is as it seems, where every time you go online you put your life at risk, and where innocent, unknowing people like ourselves are never safe as long as we own a computer. A mysterious hacker named Phate takes an all too real look at a computer game, and begins to play it in real life. In the game there were points for murder, in life Phate is racking up his own points, slowly winning the game that no one else seems to be playing anymore. In a race for time, one man must pit his own computer expertise against the best, and hope with all his heart that he can stop the killing before Phate becomes master of the game. A stunning thriller, a little jargon that may confuse you, but a story with nightmarish possibilities. Enter at your own risk.
Rating: 
Summary: Serial Killer in Cyberspace
Review: A serial killer is on the loose with an ability to assume any human identity, break into any computer system and destroy any individual at will. Deaver paints a terrifying science-fiction-like prospect with as much killing action in cyberspace as in flesh and blood. The action is unpredictable - as is the denouement. The killer plays a delusional game as he chillingly stalks victims through machines and networks. And it seems Phate can never lose - until he comes up against another brilliant code slinger, a former game partner. Gillette tracks the killer through murky chat rooms and anonymizers even as he tries to salvage what is left of his real-world personal life. Deaver sacrifices character development - except for the protagonists Phate and Gillette - to a fast-paced action plot. Most of the characters appear two-dimensional and are as mutable as their screen names. But the setting is not very unrealistic - incredible coding and bare-hand hardware making are but some of the exciting elements of this new-genre cyber-thriller. A good trip into the uncertainty and lurking dangers of cyberspace.
Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful!
Review: Wow...I could not put this book down! I was a little daunted by the idea of a hacker/computer lingo book, but Mr. Deaver does an amazing job making everything perfectly understandable. The characters were in depth, real, and emotional, and the plot was breath-takingly fast. I adore all of Mr. Deaver's books, but this has got to be my favorite. I usually buy hardbacks, read them, and then sell or give them away, but this book will not be leaving my "incredible reads" shelf. Thank you Mr. Deaver!
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: Brilliant, for anyone who enjoys computers. This book has an excellent touch of mystery. It makes you wonder..
Rating:
Summary: AWESOME!
Review: If you love technology & a good crime novel, this is the book you have been waiting for. This was the very first book of Deaver's I read, I went back & read the rest of them. A truly awesome book!
Rating:
Summary: Chris Carter here is your new Xphile episode
Review: This book was the first book I have read by Jeffery Deaver & I have to say he has a gift. Using the terminalogy out of his own book I need to say he is a "Wizard".
This book got me in trouble @ work twice, I could not stop reading it even thought we had to finish writting this code by certain date I could not get away from it.
Great recources done.
All I can say is keep it coming.
Rating: 
Summary: Plot is weak, tech knowledge weaker
Review: Sorry folks, you can't repeatedly build suspense by having the good guys run to the place the bad guy "just was". It's too predictable. And the technology was often laughable. Trapdoor apparently makes the characters on the screen fuzzy! What a riot! Sure, and good hackers can really "feel" the diffenrece in their keystrokes when their machine is running anything funny! As if you can't simply put a sniffer on a communications line to see if someone is stealing away your data. Just a few examples of the "gee whiz factor" gone wild in Mr. Deaver's head. And in the epilog he want us to believe that there is real dange in all this [...]. Indeed there is, but there's a far greater danger from hacks like the auther disseminating rubbish than from the hackers themselves!
Rating:
Summary: Gripping thriller
Review: So you thought that computer hacking was just a bunch of computer geeks having fun? No way, Jose! Get your fill of this superb psychological thriller where two hacking wizards battle their computer skills in a real life hunt for a serial murderer. Wyatt Gillette is serving a prison term for accessing government computer installations. Then the police spring him to help them hunt down Phate, a wizard hacker who can no longer distinguish between reality and virtual reality. But Phate and his accomplice, Shawn, are always one step ahead, even against the talents of Wyatt Gillette. Jeffery Deaver has written a gripping suspense novel, one that I read in a single sitting (which is something I don't often do). The action boots in right on page one, and stays on fast track through page 422 (leaving just a neat seven pages to tidy up at the end). If you enjoy being kept on the edge of your seat, 'The Blue Nowhere' is surely the book for you. So why only four stars? First, the lousy punctuation, which, in the opening chapters, kept drawing my attention away from the story (I got used to it eventually). Second, a confusion of characters. A little more early characterization or a slower introduction to the various participants would have been more appropriate. These aren't big issues and, if there had been a four-and-a-half button, I would have pressed it so, small criticisms aside, 'The Blue Nowhere' really is a good read and I recommend it highly.
Rating:
Summary: Entertaining, but . . .
Review: I found Deaver's The Blue Nowhere to be a enthralling story with good characters and a strong plot. But, as a computer professional, I had a hard time with many of his "facts" about computers, especially mainframes. I've never seen or heard a computer room referred to as a "dinosaur room", although I'm sure some people, somewhere do so. Mainframe cables don't spring to life and injure folks, and air plenums (raised floors) don't typically co-exist with air ducts. Also, he uses the term stenanography (which my dictionaries don't define) where I believe he means steganography. Worth a read even with these and other similar distractors.
| 
