Format C:

Rating:
Summary: Every bit as good as Dan Brown's work
Review: Edwin Black's surrealistic look at what could have been a catastrophe certainly makes for an interesting read. When approaching the end of this page turner, I could barely put it down. Then I slammed it shut as the ending fizzled out.

The book makes an interesting satirical point about our dependence on computers and technology. Also, the few jabs at Bill Gates always make for an interesting piece of humor. The Biblical and historical references are well founded and, while far fetched, based on fact.

While Edwin did his homework, purists may not enjoy his work. He strays from normalcy about as often and he betrays the laws of what is possible. If you are looking for a realistic book, check the begining of the review: this is very surreal.

Last, the book is incredibly fast paced. It had me sweating until the last page. However, despite the pace, Blacks novel comes to a moral-bearing and unfulfilling end. Almost like a cheesy sitcom, the novel ends on a life lesson that doesn't seem to match the plot.

While I enjoyed this book, the pitfall at the end and the slight bit of realist in me prevents anything above a 3-star rating. This is still a good read, if you keep an open mind.

Rating:
Summary: Building to Anticlimax
Review: Edwin Black's surrealistic look at what could have been a catastrophe certainly makes for an interesting read. When approaching the end of this page turner, I could barely put it down. Then I slammed it shut as the ending fizzled out.

The book makes an interesting satirical point about our dependence on computers and technology. Also, the few jabs at Bill Gates always make for an interesting piece of humor. The Biblical and historical references are well founded and, while far fetched, based on fact.

While Edwin did his homework, purists may not enjoy his work. He strays from normalcy about as often and he betrays the laws of what is possible. If you are looking for a realistic book, check the begining of the review: this is very surreal.

Last, the book is incredibly fast paced. It had me sweating until the last page. However, despite the pace, Blacks novel comes to a moral-bearing and unfulfilling end. Almost like a cheesy sitcom, the novel ends on a life lesson that doesn't seem to match the plot.

While I enjoyed this book, the pitfall at the end and the slight bit of realist in me prevents anything above a 3-star rating. This is still a good read, if you keep an open mind.

Rating:
Summary: Every bit as good as Dan Brown's work
Review: I bought "Format C:" at about the same time I purchased a hardback first edition of "Digital Fortress," Dan Brown's first novel. I have to say, as a Y2K computer thriller, this book blew away Dan Brown. It wasn't until I read Brown's "Angels & Demons" that I began to appreciate his work. Yes, as one reviewer states, this work is a bit over top. But so is "Angels & Demons." This is a heck of a ride and a terrific book.

Rating:
Summary: Great Account For Our Fears At The Time
Review: I first read a review about this book in early 1999 through a computer magazine I subscribe to. I rushed out and bought it.

I thought it was a great work of fiction based around our Y2K fears, as well as the whole Microsoft/ everyone else in the computer world issue. It greatly parrelleled all of the current fears at the time, with believable characters.

I read this book twice in '99, and it was a great read both times. Although Y2K had come and gone with little problems, I think it does characterize our fears at the time. Bill Gates and Microsoft were monoplolizing the computer world, and the character Edwin Black wrote about seemed to catch our fears about what could happen. Though Bill and his company haven't turned out to be the devil, I still thought it was a great read.

If you're a computer geek, pretend it's 1999 all over again and give it a read.

Rating:
Summary: Consumerist/4th Commandment sales pitch
Review: I tried to like this book, I really did. Even though the protagonist and I both like single malt Scotch, it just wasn't enough. Once you get through all the obvious villainy of the Gates character and the products name dropping throughout, the ending saves the world with a MANDATORY SABBATH-KEEPING O/S. Yes. The world is saved from the bad guys and now quietly reflects on it's pro-Jewish superiority from sundown Friday until Saturday night, when computers will work again. Even though the writing wasn't very good, the fast -paced plot was readable, right up until the sales pitch for the Decalogue.

Rating:
Summary: Needed a better writing style!
Review: This book starts out as a parody of the Microsoft Corporation and Bill Gates and the fervor behind the year 2000 computer preparation. It then takes a turn into murder, mysticism and Biblical prophecy coming to pass.

I was hooked at the beginning of the book and thought the main character, Dan Levin to be a very complex and interesting study. As the book progresses Dan is extremely reckless (he likes to drive fast the wrong way down streets) and resourceful. We find that his wife and child were killed in a plane crash and his parents were survivors of Nazi controlled Poland.

The major computer company (Hinnom Computing) controls the computer software market and their software is in virtually anything computerized. The software has backdoors that allow Hinnom to get into any computer and make it do whatever the company wants. The head of Hinnom wants to download to the world a supposed fix to the Y2K problem that in actuality will implant a program that can control the user's mind. This will allow Hinnom to virtually rule the world.

What killed this book for me was the author's style. A lot of events happen for no apparent reason. In one case Levin and his girlfriend's son (Sal) are at the site where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. Sal just happens to find one scroll, then another within something like five minutes. Many things seem to happen out of context in the middle of other events and it is difficult to tell if they are flashbacks or juxtaimposed events.

I would have liked the book a lot more had it stayed with the "cutthroat" computer business and stayed away from the battle of Armageddon angle.